Tehran, IRAN
More than 700 people in Iran have died after ingesting toxic methanol because false rumours it helps cure the coronavirus, officials have said.
In a desperate search for a curative, many
families have turned to fake remedies spread across social media – including a
powerful form of bootleg alcohol banned in the Islamic Republic.
Iranian health ministry spokesman Kianoush
Jahanpour said that 525 people have died in hospital from swallowing toxic
methanol alcohol since 20 February, state TV reported on Monday.
An adviser to the ministry, Hossein Hassanian, told the Associated Press
another 200 or so alcohol poisoning victims died outside of hospital.
Alcohol poisoning has skyrocketed in Iran amid
the coronavirus pandemic, according to a government report released earlier in
April.
The national coroner’s authority
said that alcohol poisoning killed 728 Iranians between 20 February and 7
April. Last year there were only 66 deaths from alcohol poisoning, according to
the report.
The health ministry spokesman said that a total
of 5,011 people across Iran had been poisoned from methanol alcohol since
mid-February.
Mr Jahanpour added that 90 people have lost
their eye sight or are suffering eye damage from the alcohol poisoning. Dr
Hassanian also said the final tally of people who lost their eye sight could be
much higher.
“We are fighting on two fronts here,” the
ministry adviser said last month. “We have to both cure the people with alcohol
poisoning and also fight the coronavirus.”
Iran is facing the
worst coronavirus outbreak in the Middle East. The death toll in
Iran from the coronavirus pandemic rose by 71 in the past 24 hours to 5,877,
health ministry spokesman said on state TV on Tuesday.
The consumption of
alcohol is generally prohibited in Iran. However, minority Christians, Jews and
Zoroastrians are allowed to drink alcoholic beverages in private. Iran also
currently some 40 alcohol factories that have been allocated permits for
pharmaceutical and sanitising items.
The Iranian government mandates that
manufacturers of toxic methanol add an artificial colour to their products so
the public can tell it apart from ethanol, the kind of alcohol that can be used
in cleaning wounds.
Some bootleggers in
Iran use methanol, adding a splash of bleach to mask the added colour before
selling it as drinkable. Methanol, which cannot be smelled in drinks, causes
delayed organ and brain damage. Symptoms include chest pain, nausea,
hyperventilation, blindness and even coma.
Public health authorities around the world have
struggled to combat a variety of false and dangerous information about the
coronavirus and potential “cures” spread online since the beginning of the
outbreak.
Arguably some leaders
have contributed to the misinformation. US president Donald Trump speculated on
whether patients could be injected with disinfectant, while Belarusian
president Alexander Lukashenko erroneously advised that drinking vodka would
help “poison” the disease. - Independent
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