APA News

  • Kent Public Analyst featured on Radio 1's Newsbeat


    Rushkinoff is a brand of Spanish vodka sold in bars and clubs in the holiday resort of Magaluf and is popular on bar crawls and boat parties. Consumers think their sore throats and chesty coughs are being caused by the drink, earning it the nickname “Rushkinoff Cough’. The makers of Rushkinoff say there’s nothing wrong with their product and deny any link to the cough.

    Radio 1’s Newsbeat decided to take bottle, bought in Spain, to Kent Scientific Services for analysis to see if there is any truth to claims it’s making some people ill. But after a complete analysis, Public Analyst Jon Griffin said: “The Rushkinoff vodka just looks like it is alcohol and water, nothing more than that.”

    The first thing the lab did was to test the alcohol content. The results showed it contained about 38 per cent alcohol. Although Rushkinoff claims it contains 37.5 per cent alcohol, scientist Jon Griffin told Newsbeat that’s within acceptable limits. He said that most vodka sold in the UK is around 37.5 percent although the alcohol content can legally be higher.

    The next test carried out in the lab looked at whether there were any harmful “hidden” ingredients in the vodka by using a gas chromatograph to separate all the components from the vodka itself. It’s at this stage methanol can sometimes be found. Methanol can have serious implications for someone’s health.

    Jon Griffin told Newsbeat: “Vodka by its nature is pure alcohol so you should only find alcohol or ethanol. Anything other than that, it’s not vodka. The results show the vodka itself looks perfectly normal. The Ruskinoff vodka just looks like it is - alcohol and water, nothing more than that.  A standard vodka will just contain those two components.So it’s meeting the requirements of a normal vodka in terms of the law.”

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/28749196