He mentions denatured alcohol which has been around for a century and includes chemicals to make it toxic or foul tasting.
He doesn't mention that during prohibition, the government attempted to discourage the redistilling of industrial alcohol by adding poison or upping the concentration of toxic denaturing chemicals, killing thousands of Americans.
Edit: I'm not sure what the entire story is. It seems as though 10% methanol is standard for denatured alcohol. Not sure if that was the case before prohibition.
> "Denatured" implies there has been some chemical alteration of the alcohol, but in fact it is just intentionally contaminated with toxic solvents like methanol or acetone.
That's not true anymore, at least in Poland and probably other eastern European (heavy drinking) countries. Due to denaturate usage by very poor alcoholics (they drink it through a slice of bread to filter the taste-altering substances), it's no longer intoxinated with deadly liquids.
So it seems our alcohol regulators understood the issue described in the article many years before.
Other way around here in Finland: in mid-90s, on joining the EU, their free market regulations dictated lethal denaturation agents could no longer be banned by national regulations, and deaths of destitute alcoholics spiked.
He doesn't mention that during prohibition, the government attempted to discourage the redistilling of industrial alcohol by adding poison or upping the concentration of toxic denaturing chemicals, killing thousands of Americans.
http://www.slate.com/id/2245188/
Edit: I'm not sure what the entire story is. It seems as though 10% methanol is standard for denatured alcohol. Not sure if that was the case before prohibition.