What to do when database fixture teardown fails in testing?

I am working on testing database accessor methods using a DB API2 methods in Python with Pytest. Automated testing is new to me and I can't seem to figure out what should be done in the case of testing a database with fixtures. I would like to check whether getting fields in a table are successful. To be able to get the same result, I intend to add a row entry every time I run some tests and delete the row after each test that depends on it. The terms I have heard are 'setUp' and 'tearDown' although I have also read that using yield is newer syntax.

My conceptual question whose answer I would like to figure out before writing code is:

What happens when the 'tearDown' portion of the fixture fails? How do I return the database to the same state without the added row entry? Is there a way of recovering from this? I still need the rest of the data in the database?

I read this article [with unittest] that explains what runs when setting up and tearing down methods fail but it falls short on providing an answer to my question.