Yes it's .5mg ... sorry bout the type-o. Side effects of short term use are debatable. We could debate side effects all day. Technically everything in life has side effects. Long term use of ibuprofen has serious side effects (blood thinning) for example. Here's more than you ever wanted to know about
Lorazepam if you're really interested. You'll notice the short term side effects are on par with most over the counter drugs. I'm not condoning this. Simply stating it as an example that is probably better than valium or alcohol. It's a prescription drug for a reason. Primarily because you can become dependant on it and long term side effects are more serious, abd to a lesser extent because of the possibility of bad interaction with alcohol and other drugs. Therefore, of course you absolutely must get a competant licensed physician to prescribe it.