Malaysian man dies after drinking banned coffee

A thirty-six year-old Malaysian man died last week after knowingly drinking a variety of coffee that had been banned by state officials.

He had purchased the drink from a shop in the suburb of Subang for RM5 ($1.5, 90p)

“He knew it was dangerous. But, he did not listen,” said his wife, only known as Ella, to the Harian Metro.

“Two hours later, he complained of a headache, breaking difficulties and chest pain.”

This sad story comes almost a month after the Malaysian Health Ministry released the names of seventeen different types of branded coffee which were to be removed from sale immediately. The governmental department acted this way because the coffees contained substantial amounts of sildenafil and tadalafil, drugs used predominantly to combat erectile dysfunction.

Sildenafil is the predominantly active agent in the widely known drug Viagra whilst tadalafil has also been sold as Cialis.

Back in 2007 the United States Food and Drug Administration ruled that products containing tadalafil had to display prominent warnings that documented the potential risk of the sudden loss of hearing. Other known – and more ‘normal’ – side effects of the substance include headaches, stomach pains and indigestion.

Sildenafil can also cause similar adverse reactions.

Earlier that day the male had apparently shown no signs of ill-health, and had taken his wife and their two children out for dinner. But after ingesting the recently blacklisted coffee he took a turn for the worse complaining of severe headaches, breathing problems and chest pains. According to his wife he began to vomit.

“I called for an ambulance,” she said.

“However, my husband was pronounced dead by the paramedics.”

Despite a heavy crackdown on these ‘sexual performance enhance coffees’ by state regulators, some shops in Malaysia are evidently still selling the products.

At the beginning of the month police began searching for and cracking down on these unregulated coffees, with the Kuala Lumpur police raiding twenty-three premises in capital in an organised sting.