BEIJING, Oct 9, 2008 (AFP) - China published Thursday a new number of children hospitalised after drinking tainted milk, more than tripling the official figure to nearly 47,000.

At the moment, 10,666 children remain in hospital for poisoning with the toxic chemical melamine, while another 36,144 were previously hospitalised but have since been allowed to go home, the health ministry said.

This makes for a total of 46,810 children who have been hospitalised for kidney problems caused by melamine, up from 14,471 according to the previous data from the health ministry on September 21.

In addition to the children hospitalised, thousands of others have received outpatient care.

However, a health ministry spokeswoman told AFP on Thursday she did not have updated figures for the number of outpatients.

According to the September 21 data, there were 39,965 outpatients. When added to the number who had been hospitalised, the total figure for sickened children late last month reached 54,436.

Health ministry officials said this week they had updated figures for the total number of children affected by drinking tainted milk powder, but they refused to make the figure public.