Test Reveals Saoirse Kennedy Hill's Cause of Death

It was an accidental OD from alcohol, methadone, prescription drugs
By Jenn Gidman,  Newser Staff
Posted Nov 1, 2019 12:33 PM CDT
Test Reveals Saoirse Kennedy Hill's Cause of Death
In this Sept. 20, 2016, file photo, Saoirse Kennedy Hill, right, granddaughter of Ethel Kennedy and the late Robert F. Kennedy, holds a relative's baby before a ceremony at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston.   (AP Photo/Elise Amendola, File)

The autopsy for Saoirse Kennedy Hill in August didn't offer much insight into how she died, but now the toxicology tests are in: The death certificate for the 22-year-old notes she suffered an accidental overdose from a lethal mix of alcohol, methadone, and prescription drugs, per WCVB. Besides the alcohol and methadone—an opioid used both as a painkiller and to treat addiction to heroin and other narcotics—Hill had in her system norfluoxetine, nordiazepam, fluoxetine (an antidepressant), and diazepam, which CBS News notes is used to treat anxiety and alcohol withdrawal symptoms. Hill, the granddaughter of Robert F. Kennedy and the only child of his daughter Courtney Kennedy Hill, had been found unresponsive on Aug. 1 at the family's compound on Cape Cod. She'd been set to start her senior year at Boston College this fall. (More Saoirse Kennedy Hill stories.)

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