Food poisoning affected over 150 students at a middle school in central China's Hunan province on Tuesday, local authorities confirmed Wednesday.

The students of the Xiandong Middle School in Lianyuan city started showing symptoms of food poisoning, including diarrhea and vomiting, on Tuesday night. Twenty-seven of them have been hospitalized, according to the municipal government.

The food poisoning is believed to have been caused by the milk the school gave to the students as a late afternoon snack.