Drug scandal fuels children's safety concerns

Kindergarten probed over pill claims

Shaanxi govt clamps down on unreported medicine at schools

XI'AN - For the past several days, life has been awash with anxiety, despair and anger for the hundreds of parents whose children attended two kindergartens caught in an antiviral drug scandal.

The Hongji Xincheng and Fengyun kindergartens in Xi'an city, capital of Northwest China's Shaanxi province, are accused of having administered antiviral drugs to children since 2008, local authorities announced on Thursday. The two kindergartens have a total of 1455 kids.

One of the parents, who only gave his surname as Zhang, said that his child previously attended the Fengyun kindergarten and had developed symptoms of dizziness, stomachache, leg pains and genital swelling since 2013.

"I thought my child was only suffering from cold, only to find that he was given moroxydine ABOB," said Zhang.

Zhang's ire was shared by another parent, surnamed Yang, whose five-year-old daughter was attending the Hongji Xincheng kindergarten, only two kilometers away from Fengyun.

Yang's daughter told her that the teacher gave the whole class "blue pills" at noon every day, adding that it was a "secret" between her and the teacher.

On the heels of the shocking discovery, scores of angry parents blocked a road near the two kindergartens on Wednesday, demanding local government's intervention in the case.

Local police later detained the private Fengyun kindergarten's legal representative, surnamed Sun, its principal, surnamed Zhao, and kindergarten doctor, surnamed Huang, on Wednesday. On Thursday, two other suspects, the deputy principal of Hongji Xincheng kindergarten, surnamed Zhao, and the kindergarten doctor, were detained on suspicions of medical malpractice.

This scandal is just another in a string of cases related to the mishandling of children in China that has tainted the country's education system.

In 2013, a 62-year-old primary school teacher in East China's Jiangxi province was sentenced to 14 years in jail in October for molesting seven second-grade girls in class and infecting six of them with STDs.