Coroners investigating Greek hotel deaths

Coroners were today investigating all possible causes, including poisoning, of the overnight deaths of two British children who were found this morning along with their comatose parents in a Corfu hotel.

The two children, a girl and a boy aged seven and six, were found by a cleaner in their room at a luxury seaside resort in Gouvia, on the island’s eastern coast, where the family was staying for a week’s holiday.

Their father, 38, and mother, 28, were rushed to hospital, where they remained in intensive care and were undergoing treatment.

Medics were considering transferring them from Corfu to another hospital with fuller facilities, possibly in Athens, depending on the patients’ conditions. Local police said that preliminary test results indicated a possible case of multiple poisoning.

All possibilities were being looked at, including food poisoning by mushrooms.

Doctors said the children had died at least eight hours before being found and had vomited before they died.

The family had been staying at the Louis Corcyra hotel about five miles north of Corfu town.