Food poisoning in Paris elementary school students! The school cafeteria is the cause of the trouble?

Fifteen students at an elementary school on rue Barbanègre (19th arrondissement of Paris) became unwell yesterday after eating lunch in the cafeteria.

Fifteen students around the age of ten in an elementary school on rue Barbanègre in the quartier Crimée neighborhood of Paris' 19th arrondissement became unwell after leaving the school cafeteria on Tuesday, Le Parisien reported.

Some of the pupils, who had just eaten lunch, began to suffer from headaches, stomach pains, fatigue and vomiting. These symptoms may have been caused by food poisoning, and the original cause of the incident has yet to be investigated. Of the more than 130 students who ate in the cafeteria, only 15 students experienced these symptoms.

The school contacted firefighters and police as soon as they noticed that the students were not feeling well, and reported the incident to the Paris Region Health Authority (ARS) and the Municipal Department of Prevention and Protection (DPP). The parents of the students were also notified that afternoon, and they went to the school to pick up their children and bring them home.

An administrative and sanitary investigation has been launched by the relevant authorities. Staff has retained sample meals and the police department's central laboratory is in charge of sampling and testing. The parents of the students will be informed when the lab gets the test results.

But until then, all families will receive a letter of explanation. The letters of explanation were sent Tuesday night by the Paris 19th arrondissement municipality. On Tuesday night, 11 of the 15 students who were not feeling well were gradually improving.

On February 2, 2021, some students at a school in Gragnague, northeast of Toulouse, experienced vomiting and severe diarrhea. The next day, more than 40 students in this school showed similar symptoms. On the third day, the number of sick people increased to more than 90, including some parents of students.

Soon, staff believed that the tap water triggered the crisis and began distributing bottled water. Alexandre Pelangeon, a health and environmental engineer at the regional health office, said the patients appeared so strongly ill that it was not a symptom of ordinary gastroenteritis, and staff focused their research on water and food, with no serious patients admitted to the hospital.

Staff conducted several tests on tap water and ruled out the possibility that tap water caused the students' illness. Staff believe it may have been food or a virus that caused the students to get food poisoning. On social media, some netizens believe that the poisoning group grew as parents became ill while helping their sick children.