Life Sentence in Gansu: The Kindergarten That Painted Its Food With Lead
On the afternoon of 16 October 2026, the Lanzhou Intermediate People's Court in Gansu province delivered first-instance sentences to six people over the lead poisoning of children at the Heshi Peixin Kindergarten in Maiji district, Tianshui. Li Huifang, the kindergarten's de facto owner, was sentenced to life imprisonment for producing and selling toxic and harmful food, deprived of political rights for life, and ordered to forfeit 500,000 yuan (about US$75,000) of personal property. Executive principal Zhu Jinglin received 15 years and a 300,000 yuan fine. Four kitchen workers — Niu Aiyuan, Wen Yafang, He Xuxia and An Chunling — were jailed for six to eight years, each with a fine.
The court found that Li and Zhu, as managers of the kindergarten, violated national food safety regulations by instructing and arranging the four kitchen staff to mix toxic, non-food material into food produced and sold to children and employees, causing serious harm. All six were convicted of producing and selling toxic and harmful food, a charge the court described as especially serious. Responsibility was divided by role: the two managers organised and directed, the kitchen staff carried it out.
The provincial investigation report of 20 July 2025, and the testing that followed, produced the figures that defined the case. Two retained samples — a three-colour red date cake and a corn sausage roll — contained 1,052 mg/kg and 1,340 mg/kg of lead respectively, against a national food safety limit of 0.5 mg/kg. That is more than 2,000 times the permitted level. Investigators concluded the kitchen had added artist's paint to flour even though its packaging was clearly marked as inedible.
The motive is the hardest part to understand. The kindergarten had been buying edible fruit and vegetable powder at 5.04 yuan per 100 grams — cheaper than the paint it later ordered online for about 6 yuan per 100 grams. In April 2024 and February 2025 the kitchen bought yellow, red and green pigments; from May 2024 the tainted items went to the table roughly six times a month and were photographed for parent chat groups and social media. The only reason given was that the colours looked brighter, which helped recruit pupils.
On the evening of 1 July 2025 residents reported that several children at the kindergarten had abnormally high blood lead levels; two days later police recovered the remaining hidden paint from its kitchen. All 251 children then enrolled were tested: 247 had abnormal blood lead results, and 28 of the kindergarten's 34 staff members were also affected. An earlier official tally of 233 was later raised by 14 following re-tests.
The testing chain failed as well. The laboratory of Tianshui No. 2 People's Hospital altered blood lead results, changing two children's readings from 292.37 to 42.37 and from 440.14 to 103 micrograms per litre, while the Gansu provincial CDC produced what officials called severely distorted results through procedural violations. Between May 2024 and June 2025, seven children at the kindergarten had already been found with abnormal readings at that hospital, two of whose reports were amended. Many parents were told their children were fine in Tianshui, only to be shown poisoning after travelling to Xi'an for a second test.
Disciplinary investigators found that the Maiji district education bureau had ignored a kindergarten operating without a licence and recruiting openly, and had run no food safety checks for two consecutive years; a supervisor overseeing pre-school education was suspected of taking improper benefits. Market regulation inspections were perfunctory, and frontline staff accepted banquets and shopping cards. The district education and market regulation chiefs were among five officials placed under investigation.
For the families, the verdict is not the end. According to the 20 July 2025 report, all 247 affected children received hospital treatment or nutritional support at home. Of the 235 hospitalised, 234 completed a first course of treatment and were discharged, one remained in hospital, and blood lead levels fell by an average of 40.21 per cent. Gansu has pledged long-term medical monitoring and care. Lead damages the developing brain and nervous system in ways that outlast exposure, so follow-up will be measured in years.
The day before the sentencing, the World Health Organization separately urged countries to do more to prevent lead exposure, saying it kills 3.5 million people a year and affects hundreds of millions of children, with sources ranging from lead paint and cookware to cosmetics, spices and industrial pollution. Bruce Gordon, who heads the WHO's environment department, said countries must move upstream and remove lead from products and environments before it reaches a child's bloodstream.
Six convictions do not close the file. Why was a kindergarten allowed to recruit openly without a licence for two years, why have the health workers investigated over the altered test data faced no public outcome a year later, and who will be responsible for these children's health once they are adults? Almost two decades after China's last comparable food safety scandal, the accountability list is still unfinished.