Drug given to prevent malaria sends 52 Andhra villagers to hospital; girl dead, 23 more children moved to Telangana

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Polavaram District Collector K. Dinesh Kumar with children under treatment at the Bhadrachalam Area Hospital on Wednesday. | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement

Twenty-three Koya children below the age of ten, who fell ill hours after they were given chloroquine tablets at a medical camp, were moved from the Lakshmipuram Primary Health Centre to the Bhadrachalam Area Hospital in neighbouring Telangana on Wednesday (September 2, 2026).

They were among 52 people, 47 of them children, who reported vomiting and severe breathing difficulty after taking the tablets at the camp at Gollaguppa village in Yetapaka mandal of Polavaram district on Tuesday. A seven-year-old girl, Madivi Jamuna, died that day. Chintoor ITDA Project Officer Subham Nokwal confirmed the girl’s death to The Hindu.

Doctors from the Lakshmipuram PHC had held the camp on Tuesday to prevent the spread of malaria in the village.

Polavaram District Collector K. Dinesh Kumar said on Wednesday: “As many as 23 children have been shifted from Lakshmipuram PHC to Bhadrachalam Area Hospital for better medical treatment. However, their health condition is out of danger.”

Special teams of doctors have been deployed at Gollaguppa to monitor the health of the villagers.

Health workers from the Lakshmipuram PHC gave chloroquine tablets to 71 people in Gollaguppa on Tuesday as a preventive measure after at least five malaria cases were reported from the village, according to a release from the Public Relations Department. Within hours, villagers, most of them children, began falling ill. Twenty-eight were taken to the Bhadrachalam hospital that day and 24 admitted to the Lakshmipuram PHC; Wednesday’s transfer moved almost all of the PHC’s patients to Bhadrachalam.

Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu spoke to health officials and the Collector late that night and ordered a comprehensive inquiry, and a nine-member team from the Kakinada Government General Hospital and three specialist teams from Vijayawada, Rajamahendravaram and Kakinada were sent to the area. Officials denied social media reports of a second death.

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