From the China Post:
One person died and more than 200 people fell sick after eating food that may have been contaminated with rat poison at a hospital restaurant in northeast China, state media and the hospital said Tuesday.Xinhua News Agency said the victims included patients and staff at the Heilongjiang Provincial Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine.
It said the victims all ate porridge for breakfast at the hospital’s restaurant Monday, and investigators suspected the water had been contaminated by rat poison.
Mass poisonings are common in China, which has been struggling to improve a dismal food safety record. Manufacturers often mislabel food products or add illegal substances to them. Cooks routinely disregard hygiene rules or mistakenly use industrial chemicals instead of salt and other ingredients. [Full Text]
