Mass food poisoning struck two kindergartens Thursday in Guiyang City, capital of southwest China's Guizhou Province, sickening some 80 children, local health sources said.

The poisoning took place at Shanhua Kindergarten and Jinjiang Huarui Kindergarten in the city's Wudang District and the sickened children were quickly rushed to two hospitals.

"Most of the kids in our hospital are now in stable conditions except some who lost too many body fluids due to repeated vomiting," said Jiang Wenyu, pediatrician at Guiyang Medical College Hospital, which took in 56 poisoned children.

Shi Jianyang, another pediatrician with Wudang People's Hospital, said 27 kindergarten pupils were hospitalized in his hospital by Thursday noon.

The kids reported symptoms of vomiting, diarrhea and fever Thursday morning after they had milk powder of the same brand belonging to Guiyang City Shanhua Milk Industry Company.

But local health supervision authorities said they needed further testing of the company's milk powder to investigate whether the poisoning was caused by the powder produced on April 2.

The city government has suspended the sales of the suspect milk powder on the market and organized departments to recall the powder from the markets.

Further investigation was still under way.

(Xinhua News Agency June 3, 2004)