Still GoblinCookie the watered down factor is still an issue.
But... typically wine, even modern day wine, actually makes a wound worse.
Ultimately yes, the key thing here is how concentrated it is; the good thing is that concentrating liquids does not require an advanced technological level. The more concentrated the wine is, the greater the sugar+alchohol content overall which means we have a antiseptic effect. If the sugar however is sufficiantly diluted then would have the opposite of the intended effect, increasing infection rather reducing it.
Vinegar is something we have to think about here I think, though there *is* no vinegar in the DF universe. Vinegar is highly acidic, but has little alchohol or sugar content I think.
Aye, this is accurate. Historically most alcohol was piss-weak until after the cutoff. Alcohol applied to wounds was typically boiling when applied so it was more of a cauterization thing. The real benefit of using alcohol was then that it has less particulate matter that would get stuck in the wound because it had been distilled.
That's what I was getting at, booze is distilled and the presence of alcohol means it's mostly sterile, in contrast to the muddy water they're pulling from the well.
For those talking about the aseptic properties of alcohol, yes it kills bacteria but it also damages the skin. You can demonstrate this by rubbing aquagel or dettol into a papercut, it will sting, you don't want to use rubbing alcohol on a wound.
The closer to water the booze is the better it would be to clean a wound. Given the choice between water and booze, they should consider water the better option for cleaning wounds and only use booze when no water is around, due to the pain the alcohol content may cause and the desire to drink it rather than clean with it.
As already mentioned, the problem with most alchoholic beverages is that they have a diluted suger content. Suger works as an antiseptic because it draws water from the cells of the bacteria, but at the same time the bacteria live on suger; the water leeching effect of suger means that eating sweets will make you thirsty. Alchohol is poisonous to living cells, hence why it kills bacteria and is consumed by human beings to keep their brains for working properly, a functioning brain being something that makes them unhappy.
Nobody cares about pain and damaging the skin; they perform surgery without anaesthetic already. Killing off the cells immediately surrounding the wound is actually a bonus because it deprives flesh-eating bacteria of food, the cells will grow back.