The birth of the breath analyser
On New Year’s eve in 1938, the first practically successful machine for testing blood alcohol content in humans by breath analysis was put into use by the police in Indianapolis. Dubbed the drunkometer, it paved the way for better breath analysers as a means to tackle drunk driving. A.S.Ganesh breathes some life into this story…
If you are reading this on the last day of the year, you know what will happen in a few hours. For there’s a party atmosphere generally during New Year’s eve as everyone bids goodbye to the year that has passed, welcoming the new one with gusto.
While the revelry has come to be accepted as part of the celebrations, what is unacceptable is if one has a drink too many, getting way too intoxicated in the process. Worse still, if the said individual then takes to driving, they not only put their own lives at peril, but also that of others on the road.
Need for breath analysers
Breath analysers were invented to control and curb this. One of the earliest such instruments, developed by Rolla N. Harger, was called as the drunkometer. It went on to become the first practical machine to successfully test blood alcohol levels in human beings.
Born in 1890, Harger graduated from the Yale University and was hired as an associate professor at Indiana University School of Medicine. Harger went on to teach biochemistry and toxicology from 1922-1960 and also headed the school’s department of biochemistry and pharmacology from 1933-1956.
No effective solution
Harger set out to work on his breath analyser in the 1930s and received his patent in 1936. Even though the idea of testing blood alcohol levels had existed for centuries, there hadn’t been any effective means to achieve the same. Direct testing of blood and urine samples were effective, but they were cumbersome, costly and were also totally useless when trying to prevent the trouble before it took place. Harger’s drunkometer looked to fill in this gap.
