Teenage girl dies from alcohol poisoning

Prague, Jan 29 (CTK) - A Czech16-year girl has died from methanol poisoning as the 42nd victim of bootleg alcohol since last autumn, the commercial Nova television station said yesterday, but the police have refused to confirm the information at the family's request.

The girl was hospitalised since January 20 as the first victim of methanol in the Usti region.

The girl was hospitalised in a very serious condition. She was sent to the intensive care ward.

"Fomepizole was applied," hospital spokesman Jiri Vondra said one day after she was hospitalised. Fomepizole is applied as antidote.

Lab tests have clearly confirmed that the girl was poisoned with methanol, Vondra said.

The bootleg alcohol claimed 39 lives between last September when the scandal started and the end of last year. Most of the victims were from Moravia.

Tens of people, including six women, have been prosecuted for endangering the safety of the public within the methanol poisoning case that broke out in September.

National bans of hard liquor sales and exports were temporarily imposed in the Czech Republic last September. The police needed about two weeks to discover the source of the poisoned bootleg alcohol in late September.