Nearly 2,000 students, teachers and other pupils in Indonesia fall ill in suspected food poisoning outbreaks after eating government-provided “free nutritious meals,” according to multiple reports. Incidents are described as occurring in several locations during the first days of September, with symptoms such as nausea, vomiting and stomach pain and many victims seeking hospital care.

The programme, launched under President Prabowo Subianto, is presented by outlets as a flagship initiative aimed at reducing malnutrition and supporting schoolchildren and pregnant women. Coverage also notes that the government continues to expand the multi-billion-dollar scheme nationwide despite recurring food safety incidents. Some reports frame the outbreaks as a new setback that intensifies scrutiny and public concerns, while others focus more on the scale and spread of the cases across regions.

While figures and timing vary slightly between outlets, they generally converge on the same overall incident: widespread illness linked to meals provided by the state over Sept. 1–Sept. 3, with the latest reports raising fresh concern about food-handling and monitoring as the programme grows.