The Nonsense of Prohibition by Julia Scrott

Thanks to Sarnia Historical Society 

Title: The Nonsense of Prohibition 

Author: Julia Scrott

Publisher: not known 

Source book: The Woman Who Died a Lot by Jasper Fforde (Thursday Next #7)

When you think of Prohibition you probably think of the United States, and the ban on the manufacture, transportation and sale of alcohol in the 1920s. Which if anything, seems to have encouraged people to drink a lot more than they might have otherwise (sources: mostly Hollywood movies and a few books). Whatever you thought you knew about a ban on the sale of alcohol, you might find you didn’t know nearly enough, so see this page from Wikipedia. Prohibition has been around for a lot longer than you think. Starting in 1772 BCE when you couldn’t sell alcohol for money but only barter it for barley. 

I live in North London, in an area designed with gardens and allotments, specifically to encourage the man of the house (because obviously women were confined to the kitchen) not to go down the pub and get blind drunk every night, but to spend their evenings growing fruit and vegetables instead. The sale of alcohol was not banned, but the founders didn’t build a pub for the community. And more than 100 years later there still isn’t a pub.

As you know, there are also many prohibitions on illegal drugs, which may change radically from country to country, but often seem to encourage more drug use. Goodness knows why, many people seem determined to do the things they are told they shouldn’t.

In recent years drugs (medicines), that were perfectly acceptable 100 years ago or more, or others that were normal when I was younger, are no longer available. Because, oh no, we might get addicted. Or we might not. But in the meantime we have nothing to take for our painful upset stomach. And any minute now headache pills and pain relief patches will be added to the list.

Anyway, poor Thursday Next has sustained such severe injuries in her fight for truth, justice and the (presumably) Swindon way, that much of the time she is in a great deal of pain and uses pain relief patches to help her. But ordinary patches are no longer enough. She gets through a lot. And is dangerously close to addiction.

Julia Scrott writes, in The Nonsense of Prohibition, about unregulated slow-release pain relief patches, not regulated because it was thought impossible to overdose on a patch, and how two people were found dead in a steam room covered in patches from head to toe. We take it that this was recreational use of patches gone far too far. 

Seriously though, nitrous oxide has been used for years as pain relief during childbirth (gas and air). Not as a result of the vastly increased recreational use of this drug, but because of fears of over exposure for midwives and nurses, some hospitals have stopped using it and women have been expected to give birth without pain relief. Madness. 

I feel we really need Julia Scrott’s book.

Here’s hoping apples aren’t addictive