{"id":40175,"date":"2025-10-29T23:06:13","date_gmt":"2025-10-29T23:06:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/laos-survivor-says-warnings-must-go-further\/"},"modified":"2025-10-29T23:06:14","modified_gmt":"2025-10-29T23:06:14","slug":"laos-survivor-says-warnings-must-go-further","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/laos-survivor-says-warnings-must-go-further\/","title":{"rendered":"Laos survivor says warnings must go further"},"content":{"rendered":"


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\"BethanyBethany Clarke<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Bethany Clarke (left) and her friend Simone White became ill after being offered shots in Laos <\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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A survivor of a mass methanol poisoning in Laos says an influencer campaign designed to warn young travellers about the deadly substance doesn\u2019t go far enough.<\/p>\n

Bethany Clarke was among a group of backpackers who drank shots thought to be tainted with the toxic chemical in the south-east Asian country last November.<\/p>\n

Her friend Simone White, 28, was one of six people who died.<\/p>\n

The UK government has recruited students and influencers to promote safety messages about methanol poisoning on social media. <\/p>\n

Bethany, who is pushing for better education<\/a> around the risks, tells BBC Newsbeat it’s a step in the right direction but worries the information won’t reach everyone who needs to see it.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Methanol is not meant for human consumption and drinking even a small amount can cause symptoms including blurred vision, dizziness and vomiting.<\/p>\n

The effects can resemble a regular hangover at first, but without treatment, it can prove fatal.<\/p>\n

There has been pressure on the government to do more to highlight the risks of methanol poisoning since the deaths in Laos.<\/p>\n

Before then its travel advice page for the country<\/a> did not contain references to the risk.<\/p>\n

It has since been updated, alongside information on the dedicated Travel Aware campaign pages<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Last week, eight countries, including Japan and Mexico, were added to a list of places<\/a> where methanol poisonings involving British nationals have been reported. <\/p>\n

Campaigners have called on the government and the travel industry to do more to inform people of the risks.<\/p>\n

The UK Foreign Office tells Newsbeat it’s now working with influencers and “student ambassadors” as part of a wider campaign to help travellers drink safely abroad.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"LiaLia Groves<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Lia Groves is a content creator with more than 50,000 followers across social media<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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One of the people it’s worked with is 25-year old content creator Lia Groves.<\/p>\n

Although she has a full-time job and describes social media as a “hobby”, she has more than 40,000 TikTok followers on her travel-focused account.<\/p>\n

On Instagram, where she has almost 15,000, the Foreign Office approached her to make a series of videos.<\/p>\n

“One was a focus on methanol poisoning when travelling,” she says.<\/p>\n

Lia says she\u2019s seen the topic talked about more on social media, and people have got in touch to thank her for highlighting the dangers.<\/p>\n

“I’m going to change how I travel now,” says Lia, who’s just begun a six-month backpacking trip. <\/p>\n

“I won’t be drinking homemade alcohol or the free shots that you get in bars.”<\/p>\n

The government has increasingly been using social media to spread safety messages, including a recent campaign about going abroad for cosmetic surgeries.<\/a><\/p>\n

“My age group are into travelling, social media – it’s kind of how we get our news now – so I do think it’s the way to go with it,” says Lia.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"UKUK Government<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Bethany says some of the government’s messages – such as a social media graphic featuring a beer bottle – don’t do enough to highlight the dangers of methanol<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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The Foreign Office shares sponsored posts from its Travel Ambassadors account, which has about 1,700 followers.<\/p>\n

While Lia has almost ten times that, many of the people it’s collaborated with have just a few hundred.<\/p>\n

Bethany believes the government should be targeting bigger accounts, and worries that relying on social media algorithms won’t guarantee that the information is widely seen.<\/p>\n

“For me, it doesn’t really work,” she says. <\/p>\n

“Because if people aren’t viewing the content, then how are they going to get the messaging?”<\/p>\n

The Foreign Office says it also plans to add QR codes, which take people to its methanol advice pages.<\/p>\n

But Bethany, who has launched a petition to get methanol safety warnings in schools and airports, says any messaging needs to be more “in your face”.<\/p>\n

She says Australia, where she currently lives, has “very obvious signage” in airports – something she’d like to see replicated in other countries.<\/p>\n

“You don’t necessarily look at the government guidance anyway,” says Bethany. <\/p>\n

“And obviously, if you’ve got nothing in the airports, you’ve got nothing on the aeroplanes, there’s nothing up in the hostels, where are you going to find this information?<\/p>\n

“We’ve still got so many people who aren’t aware of this.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In response to questions about its social media campaign, a Foreign Office spokesperson said: “We are using the widest possible range of methods and channels to share vital safety information about the risks of methanol poisoning.”<\/p>\n

This includes “collaborating with a number of youth influencers to reach younger travellers on the platforms they use most,” they said.<\/p>\n

They added that the department was expanding advice warnings and working with the travel industry to pass information to customers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Listen to Newsbeat live<\/a> at 12:45 and 17:45 weekdays – or listen back here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n


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Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bethany Clarke Bethany Clarke (left) and her friend Simone White became ill after being offered shots in Laos A survivor of a mass methanol poisoning in Laos says an influencer campaign designed to warn young travellers about the deadly substance doesn\u2019t go far enough. Bethany Clarke was among a group of backpackers who drank shots […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":40176,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[279],"tags":[6980,2390,1845],"class_list":["post-40175","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsbeat","tag-laos","tag-survivor","tag-warnings"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40175","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40175"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40175\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40177,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40175\/revisions\/40177"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40175"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40175"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40175"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}