QC students downed by candy manifest pesticide poisoning

Signs of pesticide poisoning have been detected in the case of the nine high school students who fell ill Thursday after eating candies sold by an ambulant vendor on their Quezon City campus.

“We’re considering the possibility of organophosphate poisoning, but still we have to confirm it through a final result coming from PGH (Philippine General Hospital). Organophosphate is a kind of chemical found in insecticides,” Dr. Jojo Mercado, spokesperson of Quirino Memorial Medical Center (QMMC), told reporters Friday.

Nine students of Juan Sumulong High School were brought to QMMC due to stomach pains and vomiting after they ate sweets sold by a young man who introduced himself as a self-supporting student who needed a source of income. The still unidentified man went room to room, offering mostly macapuno-flavored candies.

Eight of the nine students were in stable condition as of Friday and may be discharged Saturday morning, Mercado said.

The ninth student, a 16-year-old who consumed 36 pieces of the macapuno-flavored candy, was still at the pediatric intensive care unit where she remained under observation for her irregular heartbeat, one of the symptoms of organophosphate poisoning, the doctor added.

The hospital has sent the students’ blood samples to PGH while candy samples were sent to the Food and Drug Administration.

Dr. Verdades Peña-Linga of the Quezon City Health Department said her office would conduct further epidemiological investigation on Monday. “We will go to the school and find out who else among the children manifested mild symptoms of poisoning,” she said.

Meanwhile, the Quezon City Police District has yet to identify the candy vendor, described to be a man in his 20s. The QCPD-Cubao station, headed by Supt. Marlou Martinez, has also requested security camera videos from establishments near the school.

The packaging of the candies showed that they were manufactured by Kaykenmark Sweets Special Candies of Calauan, Laguna province. Reached on the phone on Friday, Eliza Oliva, wife of the company owner, declined making further comment on the incident, saying their lawyer would issue a statement shortly.

In an earlier interview, Oliva said this was the first time for their 15-year-old company to receive a complaint about product contamination, but maintained that the problem could not have possibly come from their end.

She said they were willing to cooperate in the investigation and would welcome an inspection of their factory. With a report from Veronica Roque