Man saw the Kaleidoscopic light before becoming blind

When Calum Macdonald arrived at the Vietnamese border, he could not read the administrative forms before him. All he could see was a “blinding Kaleidoscopic light”.

He had just left a night bus with his friends from the popular tourist destination of Vang Vieng in Laos.

The day before, the group stayed in an inn where free whiskey and vodka blows were offered to the guests. Calum mixed them with carbonated drinks.

It was not until the border that he suspected that something is wrong with his sight – what he said to his friends.

“I remember having this kind of kaleidoscopic and blinding light in my eyes and when I couldn’t see anything.

“(We agreed) it was strange but we thought it was a food poisoning and the light I saw was a kind of sensitivity,” he told BBC Breakfast.

But when they arrived at destination in Vietnam, it was clear that something was wrong.

“We were sitting in the hotel room, my friends and me, and I said to them:” Why were we sitting in the dark? Someone should light a light. “” The lights were already on.

Calum, 23, is now blind and tells his story for the first time. He was one of the many victims of mass methanol poisoning in Vang Veng last November.

Six people died. Calum knew two – Danish girls whom he had met during an evening.

All had stayed in the city’s inn Nana Backpacker of the city.

Calum is now working with the families of three other British who died after methanol poisoning in Southeast Asia.

They call on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to be clearer about the dangers that people face when booking a vacation in countries where methanol poisoning is a concern.

Simone White was one of these people.

The day after Calum Vang Vieng’s departure, Simone drank free blows at the hostel. Earlier, she had sent an SMS to her mother saying it was the best party where she had ever been.

Simone was admitted to the hospital in the following days and a friend called her mother Sue to inform her of what had happened. Later, she sounded again to say that Simone was in a coma.

Sue reserved a flight immediately but, before being able to take off, she received another call in the middle of the night of a Laos doctor who treated Simone.

“(He said) that you must give permission of urgent brain surgery or she will not survive …

“I stole the next day knowing that she was undergoing an operation and I expected the worst to be honest.”

The 28 -year -old man died in the hospital of methanol poisoning.

“It is very difficult to reconcile with what happened,” says Sue. “Nothing will bring Simone back.”

Methanol is a type of alcohol that is commonly found in cleaning products, fuel and antifreeze. It is similar to ethanol, which is used for alcoholic beverages, but is more toxic to humans due to the way it is transformed by the body.

Alcoholic drinks can become contaminated with methanol if they are poorly manufactured.

This is a known problem with inexpensive minds in Southeast Asia where hundreds of people are poisoned each year, according to charities without borders (MSF).

If you consume one of these contaminated drinks and suffer from methanol poisoning, symptoms may include stunning, fatigue, headache and nausea.

For many people, it looks like a normal hangover, which makes it difficult to know if you have been poisoned or if you have taken some drinks too much.

After 12 to 48 hours, more serious problems can emerge as convulsions and a blurred vision. In serious cases, this can lead to total blindness and leave people affected in a coma.

As little as 30 ml of methanol can be fatal for humans, says the MSF.

If diagnosed within 10 to 30 hours of consumption, methanol poisoning can be successfully treated with dialysis.

Kirsty McKie, 38, died in 2022, but it was not the result of the acceptance of free shooting.

She enjoyed drinks at home with a friend before an evening in Bali – the Indonesian island where she lived and worked for eight years.

Her friend, Sonia Taylor, said that they both felt like they had a particularly bad wooden mouth the next day before Kirsty was transported to the hospital to be treated.

Sonia had also drank contaminated alcohol, but had survived.

“We had no idea,” said Sonia. “It was probably the most difficult part for me, not knowing why you live and someone else dies … It doesn’t seem to have rhyme or reason to know why.”

On Sumatra, another Indonesian island, atnye Emmons died after drinking gin who then experienced 66,000 times the legal limit for methanol in drinks.

The mother of Nye, Pamela, told the BBC: “I think the worst of this … (was) just before starting to have a crisis, when she arrived at the hospital for the first time, she said to her boyfriend:” I really, really frightened. “”

“And it was essentially the last time (she spoke).”

The Calum advice to tourists is to avoid free drinks and minds in general. “There are many beautiful beers in Southeast Asia, which I am sure that people would really appreciate.”

He says that the learning of the death of the two Danish girls whom he met in Vang Vieng changed his perspective on his blindness.

“Part of the way I had (I had) treated it was to bury my head in the sand … I really had the impression that, in many ways, my life was not worth living.”

Calum is now learning to use a cane and soon hopes to ask for a guide dog.

He adds: “(The dead) made me realize that I was very lucky and I felt very grateful that, even if I had difficult consequences, many people have worse.

“I felt, given that I had the chance to survive, I responsible for trying to prevent the same thing from happening for other people.”

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has described methanol poisoning and counterfeit alcohol as a “serious problem in certain parts of the world” and said that it worked with local authorities and the travel industry to solve the problem.

“We seek to clarify the risks for the British traveling abroad and we will raise awareness of our travel advice and our campaign of travel conscience.”