The China Mail - 'Just two glasses': In Turkey, lives shattered by bootleg alcohol

USD -
AED 3.673035
AFN 71.323752
ALL 89.53094
AMD 391.220403
ANG 1.790208
AOA 916.000367
ARS 1072.780296
AUD 1.655081
AWG 1.8
AZN 1.70397
BAM 1.766685
BBD 2.011533
BDT 121.061023
BGN 1.786617
BHD 0.376648
BIF 2961.474188
BMD 1
BND 1.332099
BOB 6.885493
BRL 5.844604
BSD 0.996193
BTN 84.992526
BWP 13.874477
BYN 3.260694
BYR 19600
BZD 2.001147
CAD 1.42285
CDF 2873.000362
CHF 0.861312
CLF 0.025108
CLP 963.503912
CNY 7.28155
CNH 7.295041
COP 4213.53
CRC 503.907996
CUC 1
CUP 26.5
CVE 99.605696
CZK 23.045604
DJF 177.720393
DKK 6.808204
DOP 62.907224
DZD 133.33904
EGP 50.555986
ERN 15
ETB 131.300523
EUR 0.91245
FJD 2.314904
FKP 0.762682
GBP 0.776096
GEL 2.750391
GGP 0.762682
GHS 15.444933
GIP 0.762682
GMD 71.503851
GNF 8622.916761
GTQ 7.690049
GYD 208.470909
HKD 7.77465
HNL 25.487566
HRK 6.871704
HTG 130.352909
HUF 370.410388
IDR 16745
ILS 3.74336
IMP 0.762682
INR 85.53285
IQD 1305.312033
IRR 42100.000352
ISK 132.170386
JEP 0.762682
JMD 157.104991
JOD 0.708904
JPY 146.97504
KES 129.250385
KGS 86.768804
KHR 3988.349252
KMF 450.503794
KPW 899.928114
KRW 1459.510383
KWD 0.30779
KYD 0.830341
KZT 505.20544
LAK 21581.388627
LBP 89275.06515
LKR 295.434118
LRD 199.25846
LSL 18.999968
LTL 2.95274
LVL 0.60489
LYD 4.818396
MAD 9.490092
MDL 17.606012
MGA 4619.406928
MKD 56.151733
MMK 2099.545327
MNT 3504.730669
MOP 7.976641
MRU 39.72565
MUR 44.670378
MVR 15.403739
MWK 1727.378227
MXN 20.436704
MYR 4.437039
MZN 63.910377
NAD 19.000827
NGN 1532.820377
NIO 36.665011
NOK 10.768404
NPR 135.979445
NZD 1.786991
OMR 0.384721
PAB 0.996508
PEN 3.661278
PGK 4.111636
PHP 57.385038
PKR 279.668989
PLN 3.890384
PYG 7986.705382
QAR 3.6322
RON 4.542038
RSD 106.939038
RUB 84.443694
RWF 1435.583432
SAR 3.752392
SBD 8.316332
SCR 14.340707
SDG 600.503676
SEK 9.992304
SGD 1.345704
SHP 0.785843
SLE 22.750371
SLL 20969.501083
SOS 569.320455
SRD 36.646504
STD 20697.981008
SVC 8.718942
SYP 13001.416834
SZL 19.003238
THB 34.403649
TJS 10.84572
TMT 3.5
TND 3.051269
TOP 2.342104
TRY 37.993904
TTD 6.749683
TWD 33.177504
TZS 2690.000335
UAH 41.00191
UGX 3642.391584
UYU 42.149384
UZS 12873.912081
VES 70.161515
VND 25805
VUV 123.606268
WST 2.823884
XAF 592.401234
XAG 0.033794
XAU 0.000329
XCD 2.70255
XDR 0.736757
XOF 592.438686
XPF 107.728231
YER 245.650363
ZAR 19.124415
ZMK 9001.203587
ZMW 27.620652
ZWL 321.999592
  • RBGPF

    69.0200

    69.02

    +100%

  • BCC

    0.8100

    95.44

    +0.85%

  • AZN

    -5.4600

    68.46

    -7.98%

  • BTI

    -2.0600

    39.86

    -5.17%

  • SCS

    -0.0600

    10.68

    -0.56%

  • NGG

    -3.4600

    65.93

    -5.25%

  • GSK

    -2.4800

    36.53

    -6.79%

  • RELX

    -3.2800

    48.16

    -6.81%

  • CMSC

    0.0300

    22.29

    +0.13%

  • JRI

    -0.8600

    11.96

    -7.19%

  • RIO

    -3.7600

    54.67

    -6.88%

  • BCE

    0.0500

    22.71

    +0.22%

  • BP

    -2.9600

    28.38

    -10.43%

  • RYCEF

    -1.5500

    8.25

    -18.79%

  • VOD

    -0.8700

    8.5

    -10.24%

  • CMSD

    0.1600

    22.83

    +0.7%

'Just two glasses': In Turkey, lives shattered by bootleg alcohol
'Just two glasses': In Turkey, lives shattered by bootleg alcohol / Photo: © AFP/File

'Just two glasses': In Turkey, lives shattered by bootleg alcohol

Taskin Erduan thought he'd got a bargain: three litres of vodka for around $15. But it took only two glasses to kill the 51-year-old hairdresser who worked at an Istanbul salon.

Text size:

"He came in a bit late on that Saturday saying he couldn't see properly," said Belgin, joint owner of the salon where he worked in the Ortakoy district, who didn't want to give her surname.

Not long after he got there, Erduan needed to sit down because he couldn't even hold a pair of scissors, she told AFP.

"He told us all he could see was whiteness so I immediately drove him to a private hospital," she said.

There, he saw an ophthalmologist who quickly realised it was a case of bootleg alcohol poisoning.

Erduan collapsed in late January, barely a week after the city was shaken by news that within just four days, 33 people had died and 29 were critically ill after drinking bootleg alcohol.

That number has since shot up to 70, with another 63 dead in the capital Ankara, Turkish media reports say. Another 36 remain in intensive care.

Erduan told the doctors he bought the vodka at a corner shop in Ortakoy, saying it was five times cheaper than the supermarket because it was imported from Bulgaria.

They gave him folic acid to try and stave off the effects of methanol, a toxic substance often found in bootleg alcohol that can cause blindness, liver damage and death.

"He was still perfectly conscious," his boss told AFP, her eyes red from crying.

Shortly afterwards, he was rushed into intensive care and intubated.

"On the fourth day, we went with his son to see him. He was totally yellow," she said, describing jaundice, another symptom of methanol poisoning.

"That evening, we heard he had died."

- 'Six hours to feel effects' -

"Nobody should have to die like that. The alcohol seemed totally legal from the packaging and the branding when in fact it came from an illegal distillery," said Erol Isik, her partner at the salon, who was clearly angry.

"Taskin didn't drink to get drunk, he wasn't an alcoholic," he said.

Speaking to AFP at his laboratory at Istanbul's Yeditepe University where he heads the toxicology department, professor Ahmet Aydin explained how lethal it can be.

"Just one glass of fake vodka made from methylated alcohol can be deadly," he said.

The difference between ethanol, which is used for making spirits, and methanol, which is used in varnishes and antifreeze, is only visible in a laboratory, he explained, showing test tubes containing the two alcohols.

"No-one can tell them apart by taste, sight or smell," he said.

"The biggest danger with methanol poisoning is that you don't feel the effects straight away. It only manifests after about six hours. If the person goes straight to hospital, they have a chance of recovering."

But it can very quickly become "too late".

"People really need to be careful," he warned, saying it was a lot easier to buy methanol than ethanol, the purchase of which is highly regulated.

"But who would drink alcohol without a proper label?" he wondered, following reports several people died after buying alcohol in half-litre water bottles from a business posing as a Turkmen restaurant in Istanbul.

– 'Alcohol is too expensive' –

Like the main opposition CHP party, Ozgur Aybas, head of the Tekel association of alcohol retailers, blames the crippling taxes imposed by the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who regularly rails against drinking and smoking.

"Nowhere else in the world are there such high taxes on alcohol," he told AFP, saying people had no choice but to seek out alternatives.

Buying a litre bottle of raki, Turkey's aniseed-flavoured national liquor, from a supermarket currently costs around $35 in a country where the minimum wage is $600.

Standing in front of the now-closed shop where Taskin Erduan bought the vodka that killed him, a neighbour called Levent, who didn't give his surname, also blamed taxes.

"Alcohol is too expensive in Turkey. It costs about 100 Turkish lira to make a bottle of raki but with the tax, that becomes 1,200 lira," or the equivalent of 12-hours work at minimum wage, he raged.

Levent said he had long known the owner of the shop, describing him as "a nice guy".

But with Turkey in the grip of a severe economic crisis, he said he'd long since stopped being surprised at how far people would go to bring in a bit more cash.

"People will do anything for money. They have no shame any more."

Y.Parker--ThChM