ISTANBUL, Jan 16 — Twenty-three people who drank tainted alcohol in Istanbul have died in the past 48 hours and more than 30 others were in intensive care for poisoning, authorities said yesterday.
The figure updated an earlier toll of 19 dead in the Turkish megalopolis, where 34 people have died from drinking counterfeit alcohol since January 1, the city governorate said.
Over the past fortnight, 29 tonnes of counterfeit alcohol had been seized in Istanbul and 64 businesses selling tainted or contraband alcohol had been shut down, it added.
A total of 66 people were affected.
Aside from the dead, 32 people were being treated in intensive care, another eight were on a normal hospital ward and three were discharged, it said.
There was no immediate comment from the health ministry.
In 2024, 110 people fell ill after drinking tainted alcohol in Istanbul, of whom 48 died, governorate figures show.
Alcohol tainted with methanol is thought to be the cause.
Methanol is a toxic substance that can be added to liquor to increase its potency but which can cause blindness, liver damage and death.
Poisonings from adulterated alcohol are quite common in Turkey, where private production has shot up as authorities crank up taxes on alcoholic drinks.
The most commonly faked product is raki, Turkey’s aniseed-flavoured national liquor whose price has leapt to around 1,300 lira (RM170) a litre in supermarkets.
On January 1, Turkey’s minimum wage rose to 22,104 lira ($600).
Turkey’s authoritarian President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has been accused of trying to Islamise society in the officially secular state, has often criticised the consumption of alcohol and tobacco. — AFP
