MYSTERY surrounds the death of a Hampshire woman who overdosed on morphine five months after her mother lost her battle with cancer.

Abigail Ramsay, 22, was found dead at her home at Deneside Copse, Pennington, after swallowing some of the tablets which had been prescribed for her mother.

But the reason why she took them remains unclear, Winchester Coroner’s Court heard.

PC Matthew Ashworth told the inquest that police treated her death as potentially suspicious before ruling out any third party involvement.

In a statement read to the hearing Miss Ramsay’s GP, Dr Gareth Morris, said she started taking anti-depressants in 2010 and “struggled emotionally” following her mother’s death in July last year.

Her boyfriend, Mark Garbutt, said she found the bereavement “hard to take”.

But he added: “In the days leading up to her death everything had been fine. Abigail had been speaking about her mum a lot but everything seemed generally okay.”

Mr Garbutt said he went to bed at 5.30am on December 7 last year and heard Miss Ramsay snoring.

He said he got up at 2pm the next day and tried unsuccessfully to wake her. He called an ambulance but the crew were unable to save her life.

Dr Vidhi Bhargava, a consultant pathologist at Southampton General Hospital, said Miss Ramsay was killed by a morphine overdose but was morbidly obese, which contributed to her death.

Coroner Grahame Short said Miss Ramsay’s depression grew worse following her mother’s death.

He added: “She took some of her mother’s morphine tablets on the evening of December 6, or in the early hours of December 7, and also took some of her own prescribed medication. I can’t rule out an overdose caused by low mood or recklessness as to the consequences, but I don’t believe it was a suicide attempt.”

Mr Short said it was impossible to determine why she took the morphine and was able to conclude only that she suffered a drug-related death.