Is Alcoholics Anonymous Effective: A Q and A

This is a response by Ken B. on Morgan's question as to A.A. Effectiveness and Where to Find the Answers

Aloha to you, Morgan, from Maui, Hawaii!

My dad (Dick B.) copied me on his response to you.

Here are some additional details:

• Early A.A. claimed a 75% overall success rate among "medically-incurable" alcoholics who thoroughly followed the early A.A.--you may see that program on page 131 of the A.A. General Service Conference-approved book, DR. BOB and the Good Oldtimers, for the original, seven-point program A.A.'s cofounders, Bill W. and Dr. Bob, began developing over the summer of 1935. [Please see the attached Script Eight from the "Stick with the Winners!" video class for the February 1938 by Frank Amos which contains the seven-point program.]
• Early Cleveland A.A.--A.A.'s third group was founded in Cleveland, Ohio, on May 11, 1939, about one month after A.A.'s "basic text," Alcoholics Anonymous (affectionately known within A.A. as "the Big Book"), was published on April 10, 1939--had a documented 93% success rate with no relapses.

For the documentation of the two success rates above, please see the attached Script Eleven from the "Stick with the Winners!" video class.

Most experts claim that A.A. today has a success rate of between one and seven percent. For a thorough discussion of success rates, please see the following article by Dick B.: "Is Alcoholics Anonymous Effective? A.A. Success Rates to Consider":

http://dickb.com/aaarticles/isalcoholicsanonymouseffective.shtml

For a different view on early A.A.'s success rates--both early and recent--you may see:

http://hindsfoot.org/recout01.pdf

My dad and I hope you will keep in touch.

Dick B.'s son, Ken

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The following is Morgan's question to Dick B., and the supplementary answer above:

From: Morgan         Sent: Thursday, April 26, 2012 10:45 AM
To: dickb@dickb.com
Subject: Alcoholics Anonymous.

Hello Dick!

I'm doing a persuasive essay/research paper for English and my topic is "Is
Alcoholics Anonymous an effective program?" I chose yes, that it was an
effective program. For people I'm close to have gone through the program.
But, I would love to hear feedback from you about the program that could
potentially help me on my endeavor to write this paper. If you could email
me back as soon as possible, that would be great! Thank you so much.

Sincerely,
Morgan