Beth Matthews: Blogger bought substance from Russia, inquest hears

Beth Matthews, from Cornwall, was a well-known mental health blogger

Mental health blogger Beth Matthews bought the poisonous substance she ingested from Russia, an inquest has heard.

While on a secure ward she was able to frequently visit a website that discussed suicide methods, jurors were told.

Ms Matthews, 26, from Cornwall, ordered the substance while at Priory Hospital Cheadle Royal near Stockport in March.

She was being treated as an NHS patient at the hospital, run by Priory Group.

The court heard from police coroners officer Claire Smith, who described how she had received a download of information from Ms Matthews' phone which ran to 100,000 pages.

Ms Smith found she had frequently accessed a website with thousands of threads discussing suicide and methods.

One method involved swallowing a poisonous substance which Ms Matthews "had attempted to purchase from a number of sources".

The officer found Ms Matthews, who had tens of thousands of followers and was described as "bright and vivacious", had bought the substance three weeks before her death from a supplier in Russia, which was shipped by airmail through Heathrow.

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The jury was told there was no means of controlling patient access to the internet via their mobile phones.

Alerts had been issued by the Priory about the poisonous substance used by Ms Matthews in 2018 and again in 2020.

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Assistant Coroner Andrew Bridgman said it was "surprising that none of the staff knew anything about it".

A friend of Ms Matthews, Sarah Page, also gave evidence.

She described receiving a message from Ms Matthews on the day she died which read "I've taken poison, I'll be dead in an hour".

She did not get the message until later that afternoon.

Ms Page said she thought the Priory "was a place of safety" and said her friend's death "need not have taken place".

The inquest continues.