Captain Stable- I always look forward to your comments, among certain others'.
When my wife and I were engaged, she was hospitalized and diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. Having a very high blood sugar before diagnosis, whether as type 1 or 2 diabetic, creates serious problems, but the complexity of life with type 1 is often caused by a low blood sugar because of the unpredictable results of taking synthetic insulin. By the way, instead of two injections or so per day, the insulin pump does an even better job by its small automatic injections of short-term insulin, without the difficult-to-predict complications of also having long-term insulin in one's body for hours.
If a crewmember appears to have consumed alcohol, and not cough medicine etc and you have any concern at all, not just for the safety of flight but for the person's career and the well-being of his/her family (along with your company's image in the eyes of the media...and your own...), force them to call in sick and disappear quietly to their home, or a hotel. If you are fortunate enough to have a union, because no other association or corporate/government entity supports the piloting profession, and never will, call a union representative immediately. Except among certain trained fellow pilots, say absolutely nothing except that the person became ill, and never say a word to any media representative without your company's approval. If your company has no union (or a limp-wristed group, union in name only...), are there no pilots who are trained to probe and intervene, based upon fellow pilots' concerns, long before it comes down to a very awkward and stressful 'showdown at high noon'? Neither Clint Eastwood, John Wayne nor Sigorney Weaver will be there to help. The pilot's career will almost certainly self-destruct. How about his wife, possibly young daughter or son who look up to him/her?
If alcohol abuse had been understood to be a disease in past times, instead of a character flaw, as judged by society, many more people could have been treated and there would have been much less need to hide the problem-these people had little choice. Never mind the many people killed on the roads, or on the water.
There appear to be many on Pprune who are still ignorant of the scientifically proven fact that chemical abuse is a disease. They probably also believe in air pockets, that we simply push buttons with no difficult planning nor decision-making, and that our companies are committed to us, see us as valuable assets (and constantly solicit our advice on operational matters...), instead of as "the unwashed", only financial liabilities on cost accounting reports .
