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Illegal alcohol can be deadly.
Unregulated beverages may be at the root of a recent wave of unexplained deaths in the Dominican Republic. The New York Post first reported that police in the Dominican Republic were investigating the possibility that counterfeit alcohol poisoned at least seven American tourists in the country during the past year.
If these suspicions about illicit alcoholism are well-founded, then these deaths are just the latest example of the fatal impact of illicit alcohol in the Dominican Republic.
In 2017, nine people in the Dominican Republic and neighboring Haiti died after consuming local alcohol called "cleren" or "triculi", a distilled beverage made from sugar cane. The alcohol was allegedly attributed to a local company in the Haitian village of Los Cacaos, according to Dominican Today.
The International Alliance for Responsible Consumption released a report estimating that illegal alcohol accounted for 29% of total alcohol in the Dominican Republic. But "illegal alcohol" does not simply mean illegally distilled alcohol; it can be divided into several distinct categories.
Read more: Officials from the Dominican Republic are in the process of determining whether false alcohol has caused recent tourist deaths
According to the IARD, alcohol or beverages produced "outside a regulatory framework and whose production and consumption tend to follow cultural and artisanal practices" could include legal or illegal home brewing operations.
Contraband alcohol is a drink illegally smuggled into a country. Counterfeit alcohol is defined as a "fraudulent imitation of legitimate brand products", while non-compliant alcohol includes all "products that do not comply with the production processes, directives or legislation relating to # 39; labeling. "
In the Dominican Republic, the IARD estimated that illegal alcohol cost the country $ 262 million. The black market of the Caribbean country's alcohol would break down into 69% distilled beverages, 0.1% fermented beverages and 30% "other" forms of alcohol.
About a third of the country's illicit alcohol is due to a "tax leak", which refers to the practice of removing excise tax in the jurisdiction of liquor legally. And half of the illicit alcohol involved contraband drinks.
In April, the Association of Dominican rum producers advocated to reduce the consumption of alcohol on the black market of the country.
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