Maotai gets worse!

Unbelievably the evil fire-water beloved of politicians of all levels is under threat from pollution in its water source. The source of the pollution, 39 drinks factories that have 'appeared' upstream from the Maotai plant on the Chishui River in Guizhou province. Presumably many of those factories will have appeared on the tacit approval of local officals and celebrated with banquets and the odd glass of Maotai.

Accept for the moment that I'm not much of a spirit drinker and that Baijiu of any form is, in my mind, listed at the number 2 vilest alcoholic beverage (the Scotch Whisky Lagavulin making it to number 1 - tastes of peat? Apparently peat tastes pretty damned foul) but it's hard for me to imagine that anything could harm Maotai and make it less palatable.

I always assumed that Maotai drinkers survived largely because it killed any micro-organisms in the drinkers body, kind-of an antidote to the food served at some banquets, so whatever they're afraid of in the river water it must be pretty bad...