TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — At least 164 students have been taken to hospitals in Pingtung County since Thursday evening (March 11) after developing symptoms of food poisoning.

Students from Donggang Senior High School began to display symptoms associated with food poisoning — including stomach cramps, vomiting, and diarrhea — after arriving home from school on Thursday. The school said it began to receive calls from parents at 11 p.m. and that a total of 231 students had called in sick on Friday.

As of press time, 121 of the 164 students who sought treatment at Fooyin University Hospital and Antai Hospital had been discharged, leaving 43 still hospitalized for further observation. Since all the patients had eaten food sourced from the same supplier, the authorities suspect the outbreak is a case of mass food poisoning and have sent samples of the school lunch to a medical laboratory for analysis.

Meanwhile, the school has sanitized the entire campus and temporarily switched to other suppliers for its meals as a precaution.

Chang Ming-chun (張明濬), director of the student affairs office, said the students who fell ill were initially diagnosed with infectious diarrhea and stomach flu. However, health officials' investigation could find that the culprit was actually food poisoning, he explained.