While the 17 people are stable, they are not yet out of danger, Medical Service director-general Dr Chatri Banchuen said.

"Basically, their condition remains unsafe," he said.

Some patients had developed lung infections, one of the complications of being treated with respirators.

But many bladder infections had occurred, the most prevalent complication for the patients.

Rajavithi Hospital, where three of the 17 patients are being treated, had assembled a special team of neurologists and people qualified to treat the lungs, hospital director Dr Jessa Chokedumrongsuk said.

It was impossible to say how long the three patients would need the respirators, Chatri said, adding some might need to remain on the respirators for a couple of months.

The major concern of the 17 botulism patients, who are being treated at seven different hospitals in Bangkok after arriving on Thursday, was muscular control of their respiratory systems, which was weak.

A 14-old-girl, one of the three serious patients being treated in the Intensive Care Unit at Ramathibodi Hospital, was in the deepest coma, hospital director Dr Vinit Pua-pradit said.

The girl, the youngest patient ever to suffer such a complaint, could barely move her body, the doctor said. To mitigate potential complications from prolonged use of the respiratory equipment, doctors were considering performing a tracheotomy, an artificial windpipe in the neck, on the girl.

On March 4, 161 villagers in Nan fell ill shortly after eating fermented bamboo roots at a merit-making feast. The roots were later found to have the bacteria costridium botulinum that causes botulism.

Arthit Khwankhom

The Nation