HONG KONG, Sept. 16 (UPI) -- Dozens of people were killed and hundreds sought medical attention after a food stall near the city of Nanjing in the central Chinese province of Jiangsu allegedly sold food laced with rat poison, the Chinese state media reported Monday.
According to the official China Daily newspaper, initial investigations suggest a commonly used rat poison was the probable cause of the poisoning on Saturday, which hit more than 200 people. So far official media has not disclosed the number of those killed.
On Saturday Xinhua reported on its Web site that 41 people had died in the poisoning. It later changed its count "a number" of people killed. A Hong Kong-based Chinese newspaper, Ta Kung Pao, reported on Sunday that 77 people had died by Saturday afternoon and estimated the number of dead would rise to more than 100.
"Over 200 students from a local middle school and workers on a construction site in a town near Nanjing in Jiangsu province were poisoned after eating fried dough sticks, sesame cakes and glutinous rice Saturday morning. A number of them have died," Xinhua said.
"Initial investigations indicate there was rat poison in the food that was served to the victims," said Zhou Qiang, a Jiangsu provincial government official, according to the China Daily.
He said the number of dead was "less than a hundred."
Zhou, according to the China Daily, said someone could have planted the poison in the food and that security authorities were still investigating the case.
Doctors looking after the victims said their symptoms were in line with those caused by ingesting rat poison, the newspaper reported, adding that local sources said the number of those poisoned was larger than the 200 Xinhua had said were affected and that they suspected dozens could have died.
"They became sick after eating the food from Heshenyuan Soybean Milk Shop, a designated supplier of breakfast to schools for the past years. The catering service has been shut down and its owner has been taken into custody for questioning," said the China Daily.
State media said students took only a few bites of the food and began spitting mucus and blood and fell to the floor, losing consciousness.
State television ran footage of provincial and city officials visiting those stricken with poison, promising to use all measures to treat them. It showed children lying two or three to a bed in a hospital and receiving medical attention in hallways.
"It is really unbearable to see the young children dying right before my eyes and their parents crying desperately," the newspaper quoted a doctor at the rescue site as saying.
On Monday the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post quoted a worker who lives just over a mile from the scene of the poisoning as saying, "Five to six people from my village got killed. The youngest is 1 1/2 years old and the oldest is in his 70s.
"It is so terrible. I went to the hospital today and people told me there was blood everywhere in the restaurant and schools where the people were poisoned, " he said.
Another doctor at the emergency ward of a local air force hospital, who asked the newspaper not to use his name, said some people were still in critical condition. "The poisoned will not be out of danger for another 72 hours," he said. "We are watching them non-stop."
As is common in China, the authorities appear concerned about bad publicity, especially before a crucial meeting in November that is expected to outline leadership changes, and have not released a death toll or further details. State media reported Beijing sent its own team of police and health officials to conduct its own inquiries into the case.
