106 kids at pre-school suffer gastroenteritis symptoms

More than 100 children at a pre-school in Paya Lebar were reported to have symptoms of gastroenteritis earlier this month.

The Early Childhood Development Agency (ECDA), Ministry of Health (MOH) and Singapore Food Agency (SFA) said yesterday that they are investigating the incident involving pre-schoolers from Superland Pre-school, which is at SingPost Centre.

In a joint reply to queries from The Straits Times, MOH and the agencies said that as at Sunday, 106 children had experienced symptoms, though all have since recovered and a majority have returned to school.

One child was hospitalised and has since been discharged.

ECDA said it is monitoring the situation and working with the pre-school operator to ensure the well-being of the children and staff.

One parent told ST that the pre-school had sent out an alert on April 9 of a "possible acute gastroenteritis situation" and recommended that children experiencing symptoms should stay home.

ST understands that the school currently has 218 children enrolled.

When contacted, Superland declined to comment.

After the incident, the school put in place measures such as keeping children in their own classes and cancelling indoor playground and outdoor play, as well as English speech and drama lessons. It also cancelled all birthday celebrations for this month, according to updates it sent to parents that were seen by ST.

It also stopped children with a sibling who was unwell or resting at home from going to school, according to an April 13 update.

Another update on April 16 said that ECDA, MOH and SFA officers had visited the school.

Ms Constance Chen, 41, whose 21-month-old son attends the school, said she had heard about the possible outbreak from another parent on April 9.

Her friend's two-year-old son threw up 10 times and was taken to the accident and emergency department at KK Women's and Children's Hospital to seek treatment, said Ms Chen, a service manager in the banking industry.

The following day, her friend's second child, who attends the same pre-school, fell ill as well.

"I was very worried because my son had just recovered from pneumonia and had been out of school for 2½ weeks," said Ms Chen, who added that her son did not experience gastroenteritis symptoms.