"Five others were also jailed after more than 200 children in Gansu were poisoned by paint used to improve the appearance of canteen food.
Laboratory tests confirmed that the paint – which had been clearly marked as not safe for consumption – contained lead.
Of the 251 children at Peixin Kindergarten, 233 were found to have abnormal blood lead levels while 18 returned tests within the normal range.
Food samples from the kindergarten were found to contain more than 2,000 times the national safe limit for contaminants.
The case, one of the worst food safety scandals involving children for several years, sparked nationwide fury."
Edit - some additional coverage from ABC, illustrating that it was added to “make the food brighter and more appealing to students”. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-10-17/kindergarten-staff-jailed-over-lead-poisoning-in-china/107278660
Feels like this would be a good time for China’s leadership to catch up to the developed world and ban making lead paint. It’s unneccessary and leaves environmental contamination anywhere it’s used: a legacy of shit for future generations to clean up (and pay for). And of course - the human lives that are given lasting damage when exposed. All to save a bit of money because lead white paint lasts longer? Shameful.
I thought this was going to be about too many kids licking walls, not painted food.
Specific to your last paragraph. A quick search pulled up a bunch of crap websites so Wikipedia it is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_paint.
Looks like a good chunk of the world doesn’t ban/regulate the use. China does. Like Europe, Canada, and other richer nations, exceptions are made for things like art and industrial practices. Even if lead paint is “banned” you may still be able to get it.
I read “Chinese kindergarten owner given life sentence” and assumed it would be something like child labor laws, but it was so much worse. What a piece of human trash. I don’t understand how anyone’s brain can justify hurting the most vulnerable and innocent parts of the population.
I don’t understand how anyone’s brain can justify hurting the most vulnerable and innocent parts of the population.
Believe it or not, lead poisoning.
The story seems weird to me.
What kind of paint are they putting on food that wouldn’t be at least weird tasting?
And why do you actually care if the kids eat the food, to the level of trying to adulterate it? Isn’t it enough from a legal perspective to provide food?
I could see painting sample dishes to photograph for their advertising, to flimflam parents who are actually paying for the service, and then people might complain the actual meal is less vibrant, with far less risk and ongoing cost.
This is a remarkable combination of cunning and stupid.
Lead paint tastes sweet, it’s why you had jokes about the slow kids eating it, the boomers just mixed up cause and effect.
They added paint to the food to make it look better. Eye for an eye, poison those who poisoned the children. Anyone who commits bad acts against children deserves what’s coming to them.
JFC.
Why is there still lead in the paint?
I safely add paint to my food all the time now because we don’t use lead here anymore. It wasn’t always this way though, as a child, I had plenty of lead in my painted food. I turned out just fine
Because they don’t have things like the secHealth, the FDA and the CDC protecting their public in backwards nations.
Wait…
Chinese authorities are pretty strict with health and safety. It’s the businesses and establishments who don’t care. I’m Asian and a lot of establishments still have that old school mindset to do the bare minimum allowance of resource allocation, but maximising the extraction of profit. It’s not just old school thinking, but very short term minded because the consequences will always catch up.
Pretty sure @jeebaichow is taking a swing at America and the American public’s generally ignorance about how other countries function.
I don’t understand people that do this.
