crocodile
Crocodile bile as a poison has roots in late-19th-century East African witchcraft. Creative Commons

Dozens of people who consumed tainted beer at a funeral Friday in Mozambique have died from it, according to local authorities, who said the home-brewed drink may have been poisoned with crocodile bile. Samples from the 55-gallon drum of beer from which the mourners were served have been sent to a lab in the capital of Maputo for testing, though a health official said the test center may not have the ability to assess the specimens, the Associated Press reported. It is unclear whether the mass poisoning was intentional.

Nearly 200 people were hospitalized over the weekend after drinking the swill. Sixty-nine people have died so far. "As we prepared to determine the cause of death of people we began to receive a lot of people with diarrhea and other muscle aches,” Paula Bernardo, the district director for Health, Women and Social Action, told local radio over the weekend. “After that we began to receive dead bodies from several neighborhoods.” Authorities said a toddler who had apparently drunk the beer was among those killed.

Bile is the combination of juices inside the digestive tracts of most vertebrates. It is produced by the liver, stored in the gallbladder and appears in the small intestine as a greenish yellow secretion. It is composed predominantly of acids and salts.

Crocodile bile as a poison has roots in late-19th-century East African witchcraft, according to Norman N. Miller, whose book “Encounters With Witchcraft: Field Notes From Africa” describes the practice. “The liver and bile of a crocodile are traditionally believed to be so poisonous that African crocodile hunters ... must be seen to cut out the organs and burn them or throw them into the water, lest they be accused of manufacturing poison for sale to those who practice witchcraft,” Miller wrote.

The bile that was thought to have ended up in the funeral beer could have been bought from a traditional healer, according to Forbes.

The funeral took place in the village of Chitima in the western Mozambique province of Tete on Friday. Attendees had gathered to drink a traditional brew called "phombe” or “pombe,” made from millet bran. The woman who brewed the beer and several members of her family died after drinking it, according to the Telegraph.

Authorities have yet to determine whether the beer was intentionally poisoned. They noted that people who drank it earlier in the day did not become ill, while those who consumed it later were stricken. "It's the first time we've faced such a tragedy," Carla Mosse, director of health for the province of Tete, told Radio Mozambique.