India: At least 25 people have died after consuming illicitly brewed liquor in villages in northern India, health authorities said Tuesday.
As many as 125 people have been hospitalized in the state of Uttar Pradesh after drinking the toxic liquor Monday, according to officials.
Thirteen of the patients are on life support, said S.N.S. Yadav, the chief medical officer for the district of Lucknow. Authorities fear the death toll could rise.
At least 17 people lost their lives in Lucknow hospitals, Yadav said, adding that there were unconfirmed reports that others had died in their villages.
In neighboring Unnao district, eight people died from drinking toxic liquor, according to its medical chief, Geeta Yadav.
It was not immediately clear where the villagers got the poisonous alcohol.
Authorities have ordered an investigation into the incident.
Mozambique :A homemade alcoholic drink has reportedly killed 71 people and sickened nearly 200 others in a village in Mozambique.
The fatal victims ranged in ages from 18 to 60, state-run Mozambique Radio said. More than three dozen people remained hospitalized Tuesday, the outlet said.
A group of people returning from a funeral stopped off late Friday in an area where customers can buy a popular home brew -- made from sorghum, bran corn and sugar, and known as Phombe -- according to state-run Radio Mozambique.
By Saturday morning, dead bodies of those who drank the Phombe began arriving at a hospital, the radio station reported, citing Paula Bernardo, a health official in the district of Cahora Bassa.
"As we prepared to determine the cause of death, many more people began to arrive with diarrhea and other muscle aches," Bernardo said. "Then many dead bodies from several neighborhoods were brought in, which aroused our attention."
Authorities are still trying to figure out what contaminated the batch of Phombe that has poisoned so many people in the village of Chitima. Samples taken from a 210-liter (56-gallon) drum of the brew have been sent to a national laboratory for tests, Radio Mozambique reported.
Most of the bodies have been buried in a cemetery in Chitima after a mass led by a bishop, the radio station said.
