Customers choose standard wine in a supermarket in Hà Nội.

Although doctors have warned about the harmful effects of methanol poisoning on health, many people still ignore this advice and continue to abuse it.

As a result, alcohol poisoning again became a serious problem.

On October 17 evening, the Emergency Ward of Bắc Kạn Provincial General Hospital received five people, including three men and two women, hospitalised due to poisoning after drinking alcohol at a restaurant in Sông Cầu Ward, Bắc Kạn City.

Tests of the National Institute for Food Control showed that the liquor samples they had drunk had methanol content 30 times higher than the allowed level.

Previously, at the end of August this year, a serious alcohol poisoning case occurred in Kiên Giang southern province, causing two workers to die.

The workers, after receiving their monthly salaries, invited each other to drink liquor.

The provincial Department of Food Safety and Hygiene concluded that the methanol content in the liquor exceeded the standard limit by more than 435 times.

At the Bạch Mai Poison Control Centre (BPCC) under the Bạch Mai Hospital, doctors regularly receive patients with methanol poisoning, including many severe cases, even deaths.

The death rate of methanol poisoning patients here is approximately 30 per cent.

In lower-level medical facilities, the rate even reaches 50 per cent.

If the patient is saved, he still will suffer severe complications for the rest of his life.

Analysing alcohol poisoning cases, PhD Nguyễn Trung Nguyên, director of the BPCC, said that liquor mixed with methanol was the leading cause, followed by liquor soaked with poisonous forest plants, Chinese aconite, or animals.

Worryingly, poisoning due to drinking liquor mixed with methanol is increasing.

This is a very toxic substance, slowly excreted, oxidised into formaldehyde and formic acid.

People just drinking 5-15ml can suffer from severe poisoning; 15ml or more causes blindness; 30ml can be fatal.

Five poisoned patients being treated at Bắc Kạn General Hospital.

Nguyên said that common symptoms of methanol poisoning were nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea or stomach pain, headache, low blood pressure, dizziness or disorientation, lips and nails cyanosis, agitated behaviour, blurred vision, blindness, difficulty breathing, seizures, coma and death.

The symptoms usually appear 30 minutes after drinking but may be later, depending on the amount of alcohol the patient drinks.

Experts believe that the alcohol-containing liquors that cause poisoning in Việt Nam are not caused by traditional alcohol, but by small traders who buy methanol to mix into liquor to gain illegal profits.

More inspection

Concerned that methanol poisoning will continue to be more serious, especially at the end of the year, the Việt Nam Food Safety Authority under the Ministry of Health asked provincial and municipal authorities to strengthen management and early detect suspected cases of methanol poisoning, thereby providing timely emergency care and treatment to patients.

The health sector will coordinate with the industry and trade sector to strengthen inspection of alcohol production and trading establishments, especially artisanal liquor makers.

From there, they will promptly prevent unsafe mixed liquors, liquors of unknown origin or with no labels from being circulated on the market.

Lê Thị Phương Thảo, a doctor from the Institute of Mental Health under the Bạch Mai Hospital, said 10 per cent of alcohol is absorbed in the stomach, and the remainder is absorbed in the small intestine.

After about 30-90 minutes of drinking, alcohol absorption reaches its peak.

Absorption time depends on whether people take it when they are full (absorbed slower) or when they are hungry (absorbed faster).

When alcohol enters the circulatory system, it is distributed to the brain and all body tissues because alcohol is completely soluble in water in the body. Therefore, alcohol affects the brain, liver and many other organs in the body.

Not only does it lead to the risk of poisoning, say medical experts, alcohol also causes psychosis, memory loss, insomnia, seizures, addiction, agitation and violence.

It is a reason for cirrhosis, hepatitis, fatty liver, pancreatitis and gastritis.

Regarding reproductive problems, alcohol can lead to the risk of birth defects.

Alcohol can cause many other consequences for human health such as high blood pressure, heart failure, numbness in fingers and toes, tremors in hands and feet, and nerve pain.

Thảo recommends that in case people need to drink alcohol, men should not drink more than two glasses of beer per day, women should drink half that. — VNS