More Free Meal Poisonings Hit Indonesia: 7 Sick in Bengkulu
A teacher at State Elementary School 59 in Bengkulu reported a foul odor coming from the Free Meal (MBG) package.
On September 4, 2026, seven students from State Elementary School 59 in Bengkulu fell ill after consuming the government's Free Nutritious Meal (MBG). The students experienced symptoms such as dizziness, stomach pain, and vomiting. Ningrum Hartanto, a teacher at the school, noticed an unpleasant odor emanating from her meal, specifically from the chicken nuggets.
Upon realizing the issue, school administrators halted meal consumption, but several children had already eaten and began experiencing severe abdominal pain and nausea within 15 minutes. The affected students were taken to Harapan dan Doa Hospital for intensive medical treatment and have since recovered.
Bengkulu City Health Office Head Nelli Hartati revealed that the authorities immediately contacted the MBG kitchen, or the Nutrition Service Fulfillment Unit (SPPG), to recall all distributed MBG packages from ten other schools in the region. Samples of the suspected contaminated food were sent to the Food and Drug Supervisory Agency (BPOM) for laboratory analysis.
Bengkulu Province SPPG Regional Coordinator Iqbal Ramadan confirmed that officials are closely monitoring the situation and have temporarily suspended SPPG operations for a comprehensive evaluation. They are awaiting the laboratory results to determine the cause and are evaluating their SPPG operations.
Written by urgent.news from Tempo.co English's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
