Columns

I saw a group of people doing a tag-team keg stand in the middle of the Cumberland/Dundas intersection on Saturday, while the Cumberland lights were red. It pretty much made my life. If you were one of those brave, carefree whippersnappers and you’re reading this, well, I take my hat off to you. I have neither the weight-to-strength ratio nor the drinking prowess to ever be able to gracefully pull that kind of thing off. You’re twice the man I’ll ever be.

But even the most hardened liver, Scarfie or otherwise, may have met its match with the methanol-tainted spirits that have recently resulted in death and prohibition in the Czech Republic.

The Czech Republic is a small country in Central Europe snuggled in between Poland, Germany, Austria and Slovakia. No strangers to booze that’ll put hair on yer chest, the Czechs have the world’s second-largest rate of hard liquor consumption. Bootlegged moonshine has been a problem in Czech Republic since the dawn of time – 25% of its liquor market is illicit – but the government generally isn’t too worried about this, due to the cheekily close relationship between bootleggers and local authorities.

But now, the sale of alcohol over 20% has been banned for the foreseeable future, and the Poles also have stopped imports and sales of Czech alcohol. The ban is expected to damage the already fragile Czech economy, due to loss of liquor taxes and revenue for the hospitality industry. Bars in the Czech republic have already reported 50% downturns in patronage since the country was gripped by what I will term “methanol terror”.

The prohibition follows the recent death of 20 Czechs. Many more have been blinded and brain damaged by the poisoned spirits. As little as 10ml of pure methanol can cause blindness, and the median lethal dose is 100ml. Slovakians have also fallen prey to Czech-made alcohol. 23 people have been arrested over what seems to be an unintentional but unfortunate by-product of moonshiners trying to make a quick buck, generally at the expensive of povo Czechs (really, is there any other kind?).

Victims of methanol poisoning are being treated with the Norwegian-created drug fomepizole (honestly, is there anything Nordic people can’t do?), which in true Scandinavian style is expensive yet effective at ridding the body of methanol, which is normally used as anti-freeze, a solvent, a fuel, and in the production of biodiesel.

The closest I will probably ever get to ingesting a poisonous substance without realising it is when I accidentally brushed my teeth with straight vodka at R&V one time. But maybe it’s just that methanol-tainted booze has yet to really take off in New Zealand. In the meantime, let us continue to poison ourselves the good old-fashioned way: with the overconsumption of ethanol.