Two Australian teenagers are fighting for their lives in Thailand after their drinks were spiked with methanol.

Methanol is used in developing countries to maximise profits by cutting or mixing drinking alcohol with cheap alternatives.

The head of Monash University's Forensic Medicine Department Professor David Ranson told Peter Fegan on 4BC Breakfast, "The breakdown products of methanol are very, very dangerous...these things actively kill cells in the body."

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