If there's a better deterrent than the risk of landing on your butt, out of your high-paying and still somewhat prestigious job, in late middle age, I have no idea what that is! Ol' Demon Rum gets on top of you without you even noticing that, and then it's usually denial-denial-denial until the hammer comes down, since denial is part of being an alcoholic.
I've watched it happen several times. once even cornering the guilty party when he came into my office for some expense money, badgering him about this rumor that we all had heard, that he kept a bottle of Whyte and Mackay in his night table.
"Well, yes, but sometimes I have people come to visit!" was the answer to that, when I told him that the rest of us invited our visitors into the bar for a few drinks, that we did not need to stock booze in our rooms.
Needless to say, he laughed it all off, me not being ex-RAF and all, until one night when our Flight Surgeon came into the bar late one evening when this fellow was on earlies and discovered, shock, horror, that the man was heavily intoxicated, too far gone to ever even hope to report for duty the next morning at 0700 cold sober. Then he finally joined AA and all, but it took being fired to finally wake him up to reality. That's the booze for you.
After that there's just, if you are lucky, one of those wearisome programs the that let you get your medical back if you can prove that you have learned how to stop drinking, not that you can ever stop being an alcoholic.