After Tet, there is an increase in patients hospitalized due to methanol poisoning

Dr. Nguyen Trung Nguyen - Director of the Poison Control Center - Bach Mai Hospital said that recently, the situation of methanol poisoning has tended to increase. Just a few days after Tet, the Center received and treated nearly ten cases of methanol poisoning. Notably, the origin of methanol is diverse. The patients are not only from the northern provinces but also one patient from the south. The cases are all very serious, comatose, have brain damage, very high methanol concentration in the blood and there have been deaths.

Industrial methanol poisoning due to drinking "fake" alcohol

Particularly alarming is the case of alcohol poisoning in Thai Binh . A week ago, 7 people drank a type of wine that, when tested, contained 58% methanol - industrial alcohol - and only 1% ethanol - regular alcohol. This means that this is a "fake" wine made from partially diluted industrial alcohol.

“NVM is the first case admitted to the hospital with coma, low blood pressure, convulsions, severe metabolic acidosis, and blood methanol concentration of up to 134 mg/dL. The patient is still in a coma, requires emergency dialysis, and antidotes, with a very poor prognosis,” said Dr. Nguyen Trung Nguyen, Director of the Poison Control Center.

The remaining people who drank with him did not show any symptoms. After learning that someone had been seriously poisoned, they went to a nearby hospital for a basic examination and the results were normal. However, the Poison Control Center advised that they urgently go to the center for examination and blood testing. As a result, the same night after Mr. NVM was hospitalized, the other 4 people who drank with him were examined at the Poison Control Center. Although they did not show any special symptoms, 2 of them had high methanol concentrations in their blood, which began to cause blood disorders, and 2 of the people who went with him had low alcohol concentrations at a level that did not affect their health. Fortunately, the next 2 patients were hospitalized in time, given emergency dialysis and antidotes, avoiding unfortunate consequences. However, the remaining 2 people were still subjective and did not go to the Poison Control Center for examination or send their blood for testing.

Explaining the phenomenon of having high concentrations of industrial methanol in the blood without showing signs of poisoning, Dr. Nguyen said: when methanol enters the body, it needs to be metabolized by the body into formic acid, which is a substance that causes brain damage, blindness and a series of other consequences. The toxic metabolism of methanol is slow, and will be especially slow when the blood also contains the common alcohol component, ethanol, because ethanol competes with industrial methanol for metabolism. This reality often occurs in Vietnam when drinking fake alcohol containing industrial methanol mixed with common alcohol, ethanol, or after drinking fake alcohol, people continue to drink regular alcohol. However, industrial methanol is also eliminated very slowly, combined with slow metabolism, so the poison remains in the body for weeks and can cause eye and brain damage for many days after if not treated.

A 59-year-old female patient, living and drinking in Ho Chi Minh City, when going to the North on the night of January 31, showed signs of poisoning immediately after the plane landed, then turned into a coma, low blood pressure, methanol concentration in the blood 171mg/dL and is being treated, the prognosis is also very serious. The Poison Control Center has also notified the authorities to coordinate with the locality where the poisoning occurred to trace the source of the alcohol causing the poisoning for handling.

Methanol poisoning due to alcohol burning chemicals, cleaning chemicals but sold in pharmacies and bottled like antiseptic alcohol

Among the methanol poisoning patients being treated at the Center, there is a 52-year-old male patient who, due to alcoholism, often goes to the pharmacy to buy medical alcohol to drink without his family knowing. But 3 days ago, the patient suddenly felt his eyes darken and he could barely see. After an eye exam, he was transferred to the Poison Control Center, Bach Mai Hospital, where tests showed a high methanol concentration and he had to undergo emergency dialysis. The bottle of alcohol that caused the poisoning was the type used to clean glasses and as fuel for the patient, which was bought at the pharmacy. This situation shows that after the Poison Control Center discovered many fake alcohol products containing mostly industrial methanol, the Center notified the authorities, and the Ministry of Health also issued a document prohibiting the sale of alcohol products containing methanol in pharmacies, the manufacturers changed the labels, but still circumvented the law by keeping the bottle design identical to the alcohol bottle and pharmacies still imported it to sell.

Methanol poisoning from drinking fake antiseptic alcohol

In the case of a 46-year-old male patient in Vinh Phuc, hospitalized on the night of January 29, 2023, he suffered from poisoning, coma, low blood pressure, and severe brain damage after drinking alcohol disinfectant bought at a pharmacy. Blood test results also showed high levels of methanol in his blood, but he died the day after being hospitalized.

According to Dr. Nguyen, the existence of fake alcohol products containing methanol or bottles of cleaning chemicals or fuel but are packaged and sold in a confusing way, confusing them with alcohol, is really very dangerous for the whole population and the entire health system. Especially when these fake alcohols are used for disinfection, they are ineffective and cannot protect people from the risk of infection, and when disinfected, methanol is absorbed through the skin into the body and can cause poisoning. Medical facilities today can easily buy these fake alcohols for use on patients, because they are cheap, so they are easy to win bids. As a result, many seriously ill patients, patients requiring surgery, newborns, obstetricians, etc. will suffer the consequences.

Industrial alcohol chemical methanol and how to prevent poisoning

Dr. Nguyen Trung Nguyen said: “In terms of identification, methanol is very similar to regular ethanol, even sweeter and easier to drink. When first drinking, patients also feel like they are drunk, so it is easy to get confused. However, about 1-2 days after drinking, patients will have blurred vision, drowsiness, rapid breathing and deep breathing similar to difficulty breathing due to metabolic acidosis (due to too much formic acid being converted from methanol), convulsions, and coma. When arriving at the hospital, most of these cases have brain damage, blindness, and low blood pressure, and are in critical condition.”

"During the holidays or spring festivals like this, when a patient has drunk alcohol containing industrial alcohol methanol but continues to drink regular alcohol, due to the phenomenon of ethanol delaying the toxicity of methanol, it will be impossible to know when methanol poisoning will take place, and poisoning will definitely occur. The difficult problem is that when poisoning appears slowly after many days, it is easy to confuse it with many other diseases such as eye disease, difficulty breathing, stroke, etc., leading to being missed and treated late, treated incorrectly, leading to death or unfortunate sequelae of blindness and coma" - Dr. Nguyen Trung Nguyen shared.

According to Dr. Nguyen, to prevent methanol poisoning, the first step is chemical management. Because methanol is an imported chemical or a large-scale industrial production, it has been "smuggled" into the hands of bad guys, even many companies produce and trade illegally. This is the job of the authorities. Second, people should limit alcohol consumption as much as possible and when buying alcohol to drink or alcohol for disinfection, they should choose products with clear origin, guaranteed, specific, clear and complete information on the label about ingredients, uses and manufacturer information./.

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