The Yellow Death - Russia’s Illegal Vodka Crisis
Nowhere in the world are effects of the illegal vodka trade felt more than in Russia.
In 2006 thousands of Russians were diagnosed with toxic hepatitis, a liver condition resulting from sustained consumption of harmful toxins contained in illegal vodka. The outbreak proved a massive burden upon Russia’s state hospitals, often ill-equipped to deal with the disease.
In that year alone some 40,000 people died from the poisoning with their skins often turning yellow, leading to the nickname of ‘the yellow death’.
A patient treated for toxic hepatitis in Russia (source: gdb.rferl.org)
But deaths resulting from consumption of illegal vodka in Russia can only be expected to rise as illegal or ‘moonshine’ vodka becomes even more widely available.
As the St Petersburg Times reported in March this year, illegal vodka sales are expected to account for half of Russia’s vodka market by next year. Already 4.9 million litres of the 17 million litres of vodka sold a year in Russia are made illegally, but experts predict this amount will double within a year.
Industry insiders have blamed both the high excise tax on legal vodka and the global recession for making the cheaper and dangerous vodka more attractive to consumers.
Pavel Shampkin, chairman of the National Alcohol Association, told the St Petersburg Times: “Sales aren’t down but production is falling. This indicates that the state is losing to crime and the consumer is encountering products that are not properly regulated.”
Previously labelled a ‘national tragedy’ by the Russian government, the predicted rise in the sale of illegal vodka and accompanying rise in the death toll has brought about a change in government policy.
President Medvedev has now handed regulation of the domestic alcohol market over to a new state body, it is hoped the new policy will allow for a more focused approach to a market that was previously regulated by a number of different government agencies.
Whilst the death toll and extent of the problem may not be as large in the UK, behindtheheadlines asks whether the UK government might not also benefit from a more centralised approach to deal with a rising illegal vodka trade at home.
Olly Laughland
