Parliament votes to lift ban on absinthe

A glass of absinthe as painted by Degas (Atlanta Museum of Art) swissinfo.ch

Parliament has agreed to lift a ban on absinthe that has been in place for nearly 100 years.

On Monday the House of Representatives voted by an overwhelming majority of 142 to 13 in favour of legalising production of the toxic tipple.

The move comes less than a year after Switzerland’s other parliamentary chamber, the Senate, also agreed to lift the ban.

A minority of parliamentarians pleaded in vain to keep absinthe on a list of banned products – where it has been languishing since 1908.

But the vast majority agreed that it was time to lift the ban and that production of the “Green Fairy”, as the drink was popularly known, no longer constituted a danger to public health.

Around 10,000 litres of absinthe are estimated to be produced illegally each year. The drink will now be taxed in the same way as other spirits.

Those who voted in favour of lifting the ban successfully argued that legalisation of absinthe would make it easier to control production of the drink.

Not that potent

In an earlier interview with swissinfo, Urs Klemm of the Federal Health Office said today’s absinthe was nowhere near as potent or as addictive as its early 20th century counterpart.

“Toxicological data and the control of production show that if absinthe is produced in the way we foresee, it really won’t harm people more than any other alcoholic beverage,” said Klemm.

“Everyone agrees that this ancient ban is out of date,” he added.

The heyday of the mythical liquor – made from wormwood and a variety of herbs such as fennel and anise – was in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

It was popular with some of the most creative minds of the time, such as Toulouse-Lautrec, Oscar Wilde, Rimbaud and Picasso.

But the drink was also dangerously addictive and caused hallucinations, epileptic attacks and permanent nerve damage.

After a nationwide vote in 1908, the Swiss authorities changed the constitution to prohibit the production of absinthe in Switzerland.

Even though the original ban was dropped when the constitution was overhauled in 1999, absinthe has until now remained illegal under Swiss law.

swissinfo with agencies

Key facts

Absinthe is made from wormwood and a variety of herbs such as fennel and anise.
Its heyday was in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
A ban on the drink was put in place in 1908.