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Quebec hay-tractor accident: all but 5 of 59 hospital patients released

Police examine the scene in Bromptonville, Que., Wednesday, August 3, 2011, where a tractor trailer overturned resulting in the injuries to over twenty children. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes.
Police examine the scene in Bromptonville, Que., Wednesday, August 3, 2011, where a tractor trailer overturned resulting in the injuries to over twenty children. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes.

SHERBROOKE, – None of the dozens of children injured in a hay-wagon accident in Quebec is likely to suffer any long-term damage, hospital officials said Thursday.

The accident a day earlier sent 59 people – mostly children – to hospital after a trailer being pulled by a farm tractor toppled over, throwing its occupants to the ground.

Most were quickly released. By Thursday afternoon only five people, including three children, remained in hospital.

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Stephane Tremblay, director of professional services at the University of Sherbrooke Hospital Centre, said two of the children were in intensive care but none of the injuries was considered life-threatening.

Tremblay said none of those involved in the accident about 150 kilometres southeast of Montreal was likely to suffer any long-term after-effects.

”The patients who are currently hospitalized are not in danger,” Tremblay told a news conference on Thursday morning. ”It’s under control.”

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Tremblay said the injuries included fractures, cuts, abdominal trauma and, in one case, a concussion.

He did not know where the remaining patients were from. Some of those who were sent to hospital on Wednesday were from Ontario and the United States.

Police are still investigating the circumstances of the accident and say criminal charges have not been ruled out.

A local media report says the children, participating in an evangelical Baptist camp, were being ferried back from a treasure hunt.

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