57 students have been poisoned mysteriously by an unknown substance in a rural high school in southern Mexico’s Chiapas state, local authorities said.
The mass poisoning is the third reported in the local media in a Chiapas school in the past 2 weeks, causing anger among parents.
Mexico’s Social Security Institute said on Friday that 57 teenage students in the rural community of Bochil had arrived at a local hospital with symptoms of poisoning. According to the agency, one “fragile” student has been admitted to a hospital in the capital, while the other is stable.
Authorities did not speculate on the cause, but local media reported that some parents believed their students were exposed to contaminated water or food.
“We are tired of these incidents,” said Bochil officials, adding that they are cooperating with the state attorney general’s investigation.
A video shared on social media shows chaotic scenes where parents ferrying the teenagers in school uniforms run down hospital corridors amid panicked screams.
The state attorney general’s office announced on social media on Saturday that 15 toxicology tests were conducted, all of which were negative for illegal drugs, following reports in local and social media that students tested positive for cocaine.
In a Facebook video on Saturday, dozens of parents gathered on a high school basketball court, demanding answers from authorities as more than a dozen police officers, some wearing shields, watched on microphones.
A man in the video said his daughter was poisoned and tested positive for cocaine at a private lab with another student.
The state attorney’s office said it would test the student, but did not respond to questions about the poisoning
