PRESS RELEASE: Beware of ‘bootleg’ alcohol – it can cause blindness and death

Guest speaker Dr Hossein Hassanian-Moghaddam, associate professor at Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, shared his first-hand experiences as a physician in Iran responding to methanol poisoning outbreaks. “Iran is an endemic country for methanol poisoning today due to the ban of alcohol. Many people who want to drink alcohol go to black markets, where they find home brewed and even re-packaged branded alcohol. They are not aware of the risks of intoxication. The COVID-19 pandemic has increased the demand for alcohol, including sanitisers for disinfectants, due to misinformation that it can prevent or cure COVID-19. Both ingestion of drinks and hand sanitisers contaminated with methanol have caused more than a thousand deaths during the pandemic. Five percent of these deaths was due to misinformation.” 

Even though the burden of methanol poisoning is high in developing countries, awareness of the disease, from diagnosis to treatment, is still very low and contributes to high mortality. 

Stigma and prejudgment are among the contributing factors on the misdiagnosis and loss of lives due to methanol poisoning, according to Dr Chenery Lim, an MSF doctor who has worked in Southeast Asia to respond to methanol poisoning outbreaks. 

“There is such huge stigma behind just saying it’s alcohol intoxication. Nobody thought that the patients they are seeing are actually victims. People already have prejudgment for those ingesting illegal drinks, especially in culturally or religiously strict countries. For example in Indonesia, where alcohol is not allowed to be sold in the market, the source of poisonings are typically illegally-brewed alcohol which can be purchased from unlicensed 'bottle-shops'. Low awareness and possible social isolation prevents people from seeking medical treatment,” explained Dr Lim.  

Dr Hassanian-Moghaddam added that “patients are also hesitant or refusing to state that they drank alcohol. So a physician can directly ask the patient in a confidential way, and the patient needs to be honest so a proper diagnosis and treatment could be done and loss of lives and severe side effects could be avoided.” 

Given the lack of awareness and diagnostic challenges, education for clinicians and also the public are very important  to reduce deaths and to better understand the burden of this disease in many countries. 

“Policy change, going to the right people, pointing out the medical consequences of neglect on this disease, and explaining that clinically a patient seeking medical care due to alcohol intoxication must be seen as a patient that needs medical attention to save life are crucial. If there is one patient, it means there are many out in the community that requires lifesaving care,” said Dr Lim.  

Watch the video here.