Three die in China after wine and pork lunch

0 Comments | AFP, August, 2005

BEIJING (AFP) — Three people died and three were hospitalized after drinking homemade wine and eating pork on the southern island province of Hainan.

The Xinhua news agency, citing a food safety official, blamed the deaths on the wine rather than the pork, which is at the centre of a health scare in the southwestern province of Sichuan.

So far, 39 people have died since June in Sichuan from streptococcus suis bacteria, a bacterial infection caught from slaughtering pigs or handling infected pork.

The Xinhua report said provincial food and drug administration staff had been sent to Shiling town in Hainan to take samples of the food and drink for laboratory testing.

All the guests drank the wine and everyone felt sick and started to vomit, it said....