Scientists Link Moonshine to Toxic Levels of Lead
When people talk about the threat of lead poisoning, that conjures images of children eating shards of old house paint and tourists bringing home tainted ceramics from Mexico.
But a physician at the University of Virginia Health System says there's another -- albeit rare -- potential hazard to add to the list: moonshine.
The uber-high-proof, illegal whiskey is made and consumed mostly in rural, mountainous counties, but toxicology experts are warning that the lead solder used to make some moonshine stills in Virginia can, and does, poison.
Christopher Holstege, assistant professor of emergency medicine at the University of Virginia Health System and director of the Division of Medical Toxicology at the Blue Ridge Poison Center, conducted research this year that showed that more than half of the illegally brewed liquor seized by state law enforcement officers over a five-year span contained lead levels exceeding Environmental Protection Agency water guidelines of 15 parts per billion.
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And that, Holstege said, can lead to toxic levels of lead being consumed.
"The lead levels aren't of a quality that after a one-time use you'll get lead toxicity," he said. "It's the chronic users."
The research took on particular local relevance last week with the news that a Fairfax County homeowner found a moonshine still hidden in a shed on a forested patch of his Fair Oaks area property. Investigators are trying to determine who was using the crude apparatus -- fashioned from a lobster pot, C-clamps, tubes, a large bucket and a gas grill -- to make liquor. Tests are underway to analyze samples taken from the homemade distillery.
Moonshine, experts say, isn't just your grandpa's drink.
A 2001 study by doctors at Emory University's School of Medicine in Atlanta found that a surprising number of emergency department patients were moonshine drinkers who, as a result of the liquor, had previously unidentified elevated levels of lead in their blood.
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Another study, released early this year by researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Environmental Health, looked at the trends in 200 lead poisoning-related deaths nationwide between 1978 and 1998. Although the death rate was much lower in more recent years, the findings suggested that moonshine remains a source of high-dose lead exposure among adults.
You won't find moonshine in most kitchen cupboards. But experts say that hundreds of thousands of gallons of the drink are produced annually in this country -- much of it in south-central Virginia -- and officials say that every once in a while, state troopers patrolling Northern Virginia's highways bust someone engaged in improper interstate commerce.
Moonshine, whose name derives from its production under cover of darkness with only the moon as a guide, is manufactured for as little as $3 a gallon, packs a punch of 130 proof or more and is sold free of taxes -- which gives it a definite market attractiveness in some quarters. And that's why Holstege says that doctors need to be aware of lead poisoning risks when evaluating some patients.
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"We've seen the moonshine issues come up time and again," he said. "People are still drinking it. It's still out there. . . . The proof is pretty high -- it'll knock you [over]. You worry about college students drinking this stuff and driving for the first time."
And about the lead.
The University of Virginia study examined 48 moonshine samples confiscated from Virginia stills over a five-year period and found that 43 had lead levels ranging from 5 to 599 parts per billion.
Holstege said that since the 1960s, no significant studies have been done analyzing moonshine for impurities. "Hopefully this will make the public aware that there are still hazards associated with drinking moonshine," he said.
Lead poisoning can damage the brain and the nervous system and cause anemia, high blood pressure and kidney problems, to name a few of its effects.
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