My reading of that comment (the dark ages one) was simply that not a lot of research has been done on the "science" of treating alcoholism.
Maybe I read it wrong too, but it made me think about nutritional approaches to treating addiction (as well as acupuncture, detox treatment, pharmaceuticals to ease anxiety, maybe someday even something which pinpoints & acts upon the very specific alcoholic gene - the disease...)
We are still using "faith" (thus "faith-healing") a malady that is considered a disease. There might be additional treatments someday.