251 students fell ill after drinking milk in China

BEIJING: A total of 251 students fell ill after drinking milk at a school in northwest China's Shaanxi Province today.

Sixteen pupils showed signs of illness, including fever, abdominal pain and diarrhoea, after drinking the milk provided to the Yuhe Town Central Primary School in Yuyang District, Yulin City, on Wednesday morning, spokesman for the district government said.

Seventy students were hospitalised for observation and 44 students remained in the outpatient department for observation as of 6 pm local time, a school representative said.

But none of the children showed any other abnormal signs after a day's cure, a local government spokesman said tonight.

The milk was purchased by the district's education bureau and then distributed to the students every morning, Xinhua reported.

There was plain milk, yogurt and milk with walnut flavor.

All the 16 students with signs of poisoning had plain milk, said the representative.

The school's milk inventory has been sealed off. The milk's producer has arrived to assist in the on-going investigation.