The human brewery: Tee-total Texan whose family feared he was an alcoholic cannot stay sober as his stomach turns food into 'beer'



The 61-year-old suffers from auto-brewery syndrome

Blood tests showed he was five times over the limit but had not had a drink



His stomach turns starchy food like bread and pasta into beer

Uncontrollable illness: Doctors at Panola College, Texas, have published a study on auto-brewery syndrome

It is every man's dream super power: to be able to magic beer out of nowhere.



Imagine taking a piece of bread or a bowl of pasta and turning it into an ice-cold glass of the foamy tipple.

One man could tell them from experience that it is not all it is cracked up to be.

The 61-year-old Texan is a human brewery and try as he might, he cannot stay sober.



Suffering from auto-brewery syndrome, his stomach produces brewer's yeast that goes into his blood stream, creating the exact same effect as beer.



He gets drunk the moment he wakes up, at church, at work, or out walking with his family.

Distraught, his wife could not understand how her husband managed to fit his drinking into the day without her even noticing.



Once he stumbled into a hospital in Texas complaining of dizziness.



Doctors laughed when he told them he hadn’t had anything to drink, despite being five times over the limit.

But they were astounded when gastroenterology tests showed his stomach uncontrollably brews beer.

Barbara Cordell, the dean of nursing at Panola College in Texas, said: 'He would get drunk out of the blue.

'On a Sunday morning after being at church, or really, just anytime - his wife was so dismayed about it that she even bought a breathalyzer.'

Medics initially believed the man was just a secret boozer, but Mrs Cordell got in touch with gastroenterologist Dr Justin McCarthy to find out what was going on.



Investigating: Since the case Barbara Cordell, left, started researching human-produced brewer's yeast, right



The man was put in an isolated hospital room for 24 hours where he could be watched around the clock.

He was fed normal food and water.



But when doctors checked his blood alcohol level he was twice the legal limit to drive.



Dr McCarthy found the alcohol was being produced by an ‘overabundance of brewer’s yeast’ - called saccharomyces cerevisiae - in the man’s stomach.



It effectively turned the patient’s stomach into a ‘brewery’ - getting him drunk when he ate something ‘starchy’, like bread, a bagel or pasta, as the yeast fermented the sugars into ethanol, which is pure alcohol.

The dream?: The Texan man is sick of feeling like he has just come home from the pub when he wakes up

Beer brewing is a revered art. There are even brewery degrees offered at Heriot-Watt University Edinburgh

Now on a low-carbohydrate diet and an antifungal drug prescription, the man is managing to keep his alcohol levels down.



Determined to bring the case to light, Mrs Cordell has co-authored a report about auto-brewery syndrome for the July edition of the International Journal of Clinical Medicine.



The report, entitled ‘A Case Study of Gut Fermentation Syndrome (Auto-Brewery) with Saccharomyces cerevisiae as the Causative Organism’, explores possible medical treatment of the condition.



It states: 'Gut Fermentation Syndrome also known as Auto-Brewery Syndrome is a relatively unknown phenomenon in modern medicine.

