Trichy St Philomena’s girls higher secondary school 28 Students Hospitalised after eating Hostel food -

Trichy St Philomena’s girls higher secondary school 28 Students were taken to a private hospital for suspected food poisoning after allegedly consuming food served at the hostel. While admissions to the hospital began on Monday afternoon, the govt-aided school, one of the prominent and oldest schools in Trichy, has been accused of ‘deliberately’ concealing the incident from school education department authorities for two days.

The incident came to light only on Wednesday morning, prompting the district administration to form a four-member inquiry committee. The committee comprises the district educational officer (secondary), district food safety officer, social welfare officer and joint director of health services (JDHS). The inquiry was initiated after parents of the students, who visited the private hospital late on Tuesday night, protested and alleged that they had not been informed despite their children being admitted. When TOI visited the hospital on Wednesday, it was learnt that 25 of the students had been discharged, while three were still undergoing treatment. However, the school management’s reluctance to immediately inform the district administration has drawn criticism. It is believed that students were “I accept the mistake that I should have informed the education department immediately. But I got held up in the process of discharging the students. I also informed the CEO about the incident. However, not all those admitted had consumed food from the hostel. On Sunday, there was also a PTA meeting, during which parents gave food to their children. Ten of the 28 students had only taken tablets and were not admitted to the IP,” HM Savitha Rebbeca told TOI. The school management’s explanation was also corroborated by officials to whom it had submitted its response. Sources said around 330 students consume food prepared at the hostel. The supply of hostel food has been temporarily suspended after the inquiry. “We have made arrangements to bring food from outside and have temporarily stopped food preparation pending the inquiry,” district food safety officer Jagadeesh Chandra Bose told TOI. He said food samples had been sent to a laboratory for further analysis. “We cannot give recommendations; we can only submit our findings. We submitted our findings on Wednesday night. However, the argument that food brought by parents caused the illness cannot be accepted. Everyone has a different immune system, and students with lower immunity can be affected by unhygienic food,” a member of the inquiry committee said.