Dangers from alcohol of unknown origin

(Baonghean) -In addition to wines with origins and labels consumed on the market, currently, in our province, there are popular traditional wines. However, most of these “hometown” wines are of unknown origin and have not been quality tested by the authorities.

Unforeseeable danger

At 11pm on May 5, 2014, Mr. Nguyen Manh Cuong, 30 years old, residing in Nghi Hop commune, Nghi Loc district, and then on the night of May 6, Mr. Chu Van Hung, 38 years old, residing in Hai Duong city, had to be taken to the provincial General Hospital for emergency treatment in a state of headache and vomiting, and was diagnosed by the doctor with acute alcohol poisoning. Having just gone through days of treatment, with a pale face and still in shock, patient Cuong recounted: “During a drinking party with friends at a sidewalk restaurant in Vinh city, I drank homemade wine, also known as “country” wine. After drinking it, I felt nauseous, dizzy, had a headache, nausea, stomachache, and blurred vision. My friends quickly took me to the emergency room. If they had been late, I don’t know what would have happened by now...”.

According to statistics from Nghe An General Hospital, in 2013, there were 600 cases of emergency patients related to alcohol that had to be hospitalized. Doctor Nguyen Duc Phuc, Head of the Emergency Department, Nghe An General Hospital, said that in the first 4 months of 2014 alone, there were 30 cases of emergency patients due to alcohol poisoning.

Craft wine making facility in Vinh Tan ward, Vinh city.

Talking about the harmful effects of alcohol, Dr. Nguyen Duc Phuc said: For the body, alcohol is considered a poison. The organ most affected by alcohol is the central nervous system (long-term drinking will cause alcoholism - a disease classified as a "mental illness" on par with drug addiction), followed by the liver (cirrhosis), then the stomach and duodenum (gastric ulcers - duodenal ulcers, gastrointestinal bleeding)... Drinking a lot of alcohol will paralyze the autonomic nervous system, judgment and moral consciousness. When drinking alcoholic beverages, many organs in the body must work hard to detoxify, silently destroying the user's body. Recently, the department has received a number of cases of alcohol poisoning and methanol poisoning (methanol is only used in industry, when mixed into alcohol, it will lead to blindness and death).

Still floating?

We went to Nghi An commune, Vinh city, one of the long-standing addresses for "banana leaf corked wine". Seeing customers, Mr. Nguyen Van C, hamlet 3, warmly invited: "My family always has at least 100 liters of wine. The quality of the wine is good, the price is reasonable". According to Mr. C, his family's wine is not only imported for restaurants in the city but also given as gifts to guests from afar. In addition to his family, there are many households here with a tradition of making wine. The price of each liter of normal wine ranges from 25 - 30 thousand VND. Good wine with high alcohol concentration will have a higher price according to customer agreement. According to incomplete statistics, Nghi An commune currently has more than 45 households specializing in making wine, mainly selling to familiar customers, importing to restaurants in the commune, Vinh city and Ha Tinh. However, apart from dozens of traditional craft wine production facilities in Nghi Phu commune, only Thanh Thanh Dat Company Limited has a license to build a wine production facility from Nghi Phu wine products.

As introduced, we continued to look for other addresses, Mrs. Nguyen Thi Huong, Vinh Tan Ward, Vinh City. This is a facility that often imports wine for barbecue restaurants on Nguyen Van Cu Street (Vinh City). Knowing that we "intended" to import wine for consumption, Mrs. Huong gave us prices for different types of wine, the lowest price was 20,000 VND/liter, the highest was 35,000 VND/liter. After asking about the quality of the wines on the market with different prices, which were cheaper than here, Mrs. Huong revealed that there was a type of wine yeast made from yeast powder originating from China, which only needed to be fermented for 1 day to become wine, not 10-15 days like the traditional wine making process. However, to buy that cheap wine, we had to buy it from street vendors.

A survey of the consumer market at restaurants on Nguyen Van Cu Street, the Food Market in the Citadel, or Hong Bang Street, Phan Dang Luu Street..., where restaurants and eateries are concentrated in Vinh City, shows that most of the customers at these restaurants use "country" wine of unknown origin. Mr. Nguyen Xuan Hong, owner of a restaurant specializing in grilled food on Nguyen Van Cu Street, said that this area has about a dozen drinking establishments operating, peaking from 5pm to 10pm, with drinking customers being workers from all over the countryside. On average, each week, Mr. Hong imports about 100 liters of white wine from a distillery in Hung Nguyen District.

To ensure the rights of consumers and help the wine market be healthy, the Government issued Decree 94/2012/ND-CP on wine production and trading. Accordingly, all types of wine must have stamps and labels and the production and trading of wine must have a license and this decree has been effective since January 1, 2013. According to the management hierarchy, the Department of Industry and Trade issues wholesale wine licenses, industrial wine production licenses with a scale of less than 3 million liters/year, and food safety certificates. The Economic and Infrastructure Department of districts, towns, and cities issues wine retail licenses and craft wine production licenses. The People's Committees of wards and communes issue certificates of registration for craft wine production to sell to licensed businesses for reprocessing... The regulations are like that, but most craft wine production establishments do not strictly comply.

According to the Department of Industry and Trade, due to the small scale of manual production, associated with animal husbandry, wine-making establishments are often located too close to livestock and poultry farms, with makeshift facilities that do not ensure food hygiene and safety, and therefore do not meet the standards required to be granted a certificate of food safety eligibility. According to the Nghe An Market Management Department, in 2013, 200 packages of smuggled yeast bearing Chinese labels and 216 bottles of foreign wine of unknown origin were discovered and confiscated. However, the authorities have not yet been able to control the types of wine. For small-scale wine-making households, or households in regions with a tradition of wine-making, relevant departments and branches have not yet implemented specific instructions for localities and households that register to produce wine in accordance with standards, ensuring food hygiene and safety procedures...

To inspect and control the quality of craft wine production facilities in accordance with Decree 94, the authorities need to strengthen inspections, remind and guide small-scale wine production and trading households to gradually comply with the provisions of the law. In addition, the People's Committees of cities, towns and districts need to promote the dissemination of regulations on wine production and trading, encourage producers to comply with regulations and create favorable conditions for the management of wine production and trading licenses. Localities need to organize the supervision of craft villages, organizations and individuals producing and trading wine to properly implement procedures and conditions in production and trading, ensuring food hygiene and safety to ensure the health of consumers, avoiding unfortunate cases caused by fake and poor quality wine.

Pham Ngan