Two people have died after eating death cap mushrooms at a New Year's Eve dinner party in Canberra.

The deaths were confirmed by a spokesman for Sydney's Royal Prince Alfred Hospital this morning.

The victims were waiting for liver transplants after eating the fungus.

"It (the mushroom's toxin) is particularly toxic to the liver so you will eventually go into a liver failure and that's how these individuals would have succumbed to death," Dr Naren Gunja from the NSW Poisons Information Centre said.

Four people ate the toxic mushrooms, which look very similar to a popular edible Chinese mushroom.

One has been released from Canberra hospital and another is still receiving treatment in Sydney.

Director of the Emergency Department at the Canberra Hospital, Dr Michael Hall, says the odds are stacked against anyone who ingests a death cap mushroom.

"Your chance of dying after a significant ingestion of death cap mushroom is ... between 25 and 50 per cent," he said.

Tasmanian food writer Graeme Phillips says the deaths highlight the need for more detailed public information.

He says he has gathered wild mushrooms in France and Italy, where identification charts can be checked and chemists can identify dangerous varieties.

"Here, the only people that really know what they're doing are the migrants from Europe, eastern Europe and so on - I don't know of any published guides to the toxicology of Australia's fungi," he said.

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume. Watch Duration: 3 minutes 36 seconds 3 m 36 s Brett Summerill from the Royal Botanic Gardens speaks about the dangers of poisonous mushrooms.