Twenty-eight fourth graders from Tien Hai Elementary School in Tien Hai District, Thai Binh Province, northern Vietnam developed symptoms of possible food poisoning after joining a party on Thursday to mark the Moon Festival, confirmed a local health official.

Among them, 25 were hospitalized while three others received home treatment, To Thi Hong Van, deputy head of the Tien Hai Medical Center, told Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper.

These 25 have been discharged from the hospital after their health conditions became stable, she added.

Earlier, they and nine other classmates attended a Moon Festival celebration held in their class by their parents on Thursday at noon, with banh bong lan trung muoi (salted egg sponge cake) and other snacks served at the party.

During the celebration, 28 students ate banh bong lan trung muoi while the remaining nine did not sample the dish.

These 28 showed symptoms of possible food poisoning such as stomachache, vomiting, diarrhea, and fever on Thursday afternoon.

On being notified of the incident, the local health authority inspected a bakery that provided the banh bong lan trung muoi for the party.

The health authority collected the leftovers of the cake at the party, vomitus and stool samples from the affected students, and a sample of meat floss, which is one of the ingredients to make the cake, and sent them to the National Institute for Food Control for testing.

While waiting for the test results, the health authority asked the owner of the bakery to suspend operations and urgently recall their suspected products to prevent a risk of possible food poisoning.

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