Chinese fruit blamed for kids poisoning

German health experts say that the biggest food poisoning case in the country's history that left 11…

German health experts say that the biggest food poisoning case in the country's history that left 11,000 school children and nursery school kids sick was caused by deep frozen strawberries - imported from China.

China is the world's biggest exporter of strawberries and the fruit that caused the current food poisoning outbreak were harvested in the Chinese province of Shangdong, and then spent a month being transported by ship to Germany.

In July the 44 tonnes of the fruit that were the cause of the food poisoning arrived in Hamburg and were delivered to the school caterer Sodexo.

What was in the strawberries that caused the children to be sick has still not been found, but it has been confirmed that all of the ill children had one thing in common - they had eaten the strawberries.

A spokeswomen for the German consumer association Silke Schwartau said that the reason that cheap imported strawberries were imported from China was cost.

She said: "Parents pay between 1.50 and 3 euros per meal, most parents do not want to or can't afford to pay more."