1 min ago - BREAKING NEWS - Khmer Times
More than 100 students suffer food poisoning in Banteay Meanchey
The health department in Banteay Meanchey province is investigating a case of food poisoning that left 140 students hospitalised in Preah Netr Preah district, where a South Korean charity group on Friday donated vegetable rice packets which are now being tested.

Keo Sophaktra, district health department director, said that 140 students at Pouy Samroung Primary School suffered poisoning and were hospitalised on Friday. He noted that all but six of them have since been discharged.


Mr Sophaktra said the department could not establish why the students suffered food poisoning after the hospital said it doubted that the vegetables in the food packets were the cause.

“We have sent samples to Phnom Penh for testing,” he said. “We doubt that they suffered poisoning after eating from the rice packets.”

Meas Rithy, district police chief, said that on Friday afternoon a group from a South Korean charity went to the Pouy Samroung Primary School to launch a restroom, which the charity built, and also hand out food packets to 287 students.
https://www.khmertimeskh.com/568363/mor ... -meanchey/

prahocalypse now wrote: ↑Sun Jan 13, 2019 6:10 pm Does this have anything to do with those South Korean students who died in mysterious circumstances?

This is quite a coincidence, but for the moment, there doesn't seem to be a link between the two cases.

Missionaries’ donation causes mass food poisoning in Banteay Meanchey
Long Kimmarita | Publication date 14 January 2019 | 08:24 ICT

Over one hundred pupils aged between six and 12 in Banteay Meanchey province simultaneously contracted food poisoning on Friday, after eating packed rice donated by Korean missionaries.

Of the 142 pupils from Poy Samrong primary school in Preah Netr Preah district’s Preah Netr Preah commune who contracted food poisoning, 12 are still receiving medical treatment at the district referral hospital.

District deputy police chief Heth Chhunhai told The Post on Sunday that the cause of the outbreak was a donation of rice by Korean students visiting as missionaries.

“Korean Christian missionaries visited the children and they offered them rice. Immediately after eating the rice, the children were taken to hospital as they became dehydrated and weak as they were vomiting and had diarrhoea,” he said.

Chhunhai continued that authorities sent the food to a laboratory, concluding that vegetables in the rice carried chemicals that made the children ill.

The missionaries said they bought the food in the province’s Sisophon town and cooked it themselves. Authorities questioned the missionaries but did not detain them, allowing them to return to Korea.

Poy Samrong primary school director Vath Vong could not be reached for comment, but he earlier confirmed to a local online media outlet that the Korean students visited the school to promote the Christian faith.

“They played games with children in addition to distributing candy, rice, drinking water and T-shirts,” he said.
https://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/ ... y-meanchey