Drink pills danger

Published 30 Sep 2009 12:00 0 Comments

A WOMAN died after drugs prescribed to help her drink addiction reacted with alcohol.

Jacqueline Burbidge, 61, was found dead at her home in Brock Gardens, west Reading, on March 8. She is thought to have died earlier that day and toxicology tests found both alcohol and clomethiazole, a drug prescribed to treat withdrawal symptoms which can cause heart and lung failure if combined with alcohol.

Recording a misadventure verdict at an inquest into the death last week, Berkshire coroner Peter Bedford said: "There is nothing I've seen that Jacqueline has done anything deliberately to end her life.

"She had a habit of drinking and found that difficult. She had been taking medication to try to help her with that and the irony is putting the two together could potentially be damaging."

Her brother Norman Beauvois, speaking after Tuesday's inquest with his brother Victor, said: "It was just a mistake."

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This article appeared in Reading Chronicle 30 Sep 09

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