Weeping parents bury their poisoned children

Weeping and stunned with disbelief, parents today laid to rest some of the 27 Filipino schoolchildren who died of poisoning after eating improperly prepared cassava root.

More than 100 other people remained in hospital with severe stomach pains and diarrhoea.

The victims, most aged between seven and 13, bought the deep-fried caramelised cassava from vendors during break time at the San Jose school in Mabini town on the central island of Bohol.

One of the two vendors was also ill and still in hospital today, while the other was in police custody to protect her from outraged parents.

Police have not ruled out criminal charges against the vendors.

Investigators were checking whether the vendors failed to properly cook the cassava, and studying unconfirmed reports that tainted cooking oil was used, said Health Secretary Manuel Dayrit.

Starchy cassava roots, while rich in protein, minerals and vitamins, are poisonous without proper preparation. The human digestive system can convert part of them into cyanide if they are eaten raw.

“I pray to God that this will never happen again,” President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo said as she visited Mabini, consoling parents. “I want the police to work with the health authorities to give me a detailed report on why and how this unfortunate incident happened.”

At a foothill cemetery, parents, residents and officials watched 12 coffins placed into side-by-side concrete niches.

“Maybe everyone here is still in shock,” Mayor Stephan Rances said with tears in his eyes as workers nailed the coffins shut before sealing the niches with cement. Relatives wept nearby.

Before the funeral, men shouldered the coffins on bamboo platforms into a small, packed Roman Catholic chapel, where they were lined up before an altar in the sweltering heat.

Overcome with grief, Lorenza Asas, mother of seven-year-old Sherwin Asas, stomped her feet on the floor. “I can’t accept that my son is dead,” she said, as her relatives tried to calm her.

Anicita Luyong, 33, grieved over the coffin of her seven-year-old son, Wilfredo, in her house near the school.

She said the boy, who had wanted to be a soldier, came home crying with severe abdominal pain.

He was taken to a hospital but did not survive.

“Our village is poor. Our rice farms are parched. We have no hope of a good harvest this season because there was no rain,” she said. “The youth in the village are striving hard to study because we are poor.”

Teacher Jennifer Hutuhot, 28, said the children had been playing happily during their break.

“Coming back from recess into the room after 15 minutes, students began throwing up,” she said.

“Cheer turned into panic. The children were rushed to the hospitals, leaving their schoolbags behind.”