BEIJING — China’s tally of the number of children sickened by tainted milk products has doubled to nearly 12,900 as the government confronts a scandal over widespread contamination of the milk supply.
More than 80 percent of the 12,892 children hospitalized in recent weeks were 2 years old or younger, the Health Ministry said in a statement posted on its website late Sunday. The statement said most consumed infant formula from one company, the Shijiazhuang Sanlu Group Co., the dairy at the center of one of China’s worst food safety scandals in years.
Over the weekend, the Chinese territory of Hong Kong reported the first known illness outside mainland China — a 3-year-old girl who developed kidney stones after drinking Chinese dairy products. She was discharged from the hospital, the government said.
In the two weeks since the government first acknowledged the contamination, it has issued recalls for dairy products from 22 companies after tests turned up traces of the industrial chemical melamine.
