A French student has been fined S$600 (£348) by a Singapore court after filming himself licking a drinking straw from an orange juice vending machine and placing it back in the dispenser in what prosecutors described as a stunt for social media.

Didier Gaspard Owen Maximilien, 19, pleaded guilty on Thursday to one count of public nuisance over the incident, which took place in March and triggered widespread criticism after the video spread online.

The teenager, who is studying at a business school in Singapore, uploaded the clip to Instagram with the caption: "City is not safe".

The footage was later reposted by a community page, picked up by local media and drew widespread condemnation from viewers.

The court heard that Maximilien attended a boxing class at Goldhill Centre in Singapore's Thomson area on 12 March before approaching an iJooz vending machine at about 2pm to buy a drink.

He removed a straw from the dispenser, licked around half of it while recording an Instagram story, then returned it to the dispenser. After finishing the recording, he collected his orange juice, retrieved the same straw and left. He later edited the footage before uploading it online.

The company operating the vending machine filed a police report after the video went viral and replaced all 500 straws inside the dispenser as a precaution. The machine was also sanitised.

Prosecutors sought a financial penalty rather than imprisonment, arguing that the act was staged for social media and risked damaging public confidence in the hygiene of a vending machine used by members of the public.

They acknowledged, however, that Maximilien had retrieved the same straw himself, that nobody else had used it, there was no evidence anyone had been harmed, and that he had pleaded guilty at the earliest opportunity.

Another charge of mischief was taken into consideration during sentencing.

District Judge Kelly Ho said community-based sentences, including probation, would ordinarily have been considered given the teenager's age and the circumstances of the offence. However, she ruled that a fine was the more appropriate sentence because Maximilien is due to return to France from September to December as part of his studies, making probation difficult to administer.

His lawyer, Kalidass Murugayan, also argued that probation would be impractical because the student's father works in France.

The defence stressed that the contaminated straw had never been intended for public use because Maximilien removed it himself after filming the video.

"He is truly sorry for having caused all this trouble, and he realises that what appeared to him at that time as something perhaps playful has turned out to be something very consequential," Mr Murugayan told the court.

The lawyer added that Maximilien's family had counselled him on the importance of taking responsibility for his actions and that his parents would ensure he paid the fine himself.

Deputy public prosecutor Maximilian Chew told the court that Singapore's immigration authority would separately decide whether Maximilien would be allowed to retain his student pass after the criminal proceedings concluded.

"(The prosecution's) sentencing position is independent of the outcome of the accused's student pass," Mr Chew said.

Under Singaporean law, public nuisance carries a maximum penalty of three months' imprisonment, a fine of up to S$2,000 (£1,160), or both.

The case prompted iJooz, whose freshly squeezed orange juice vending machines are common across shopping centres, transport hubs and housing estates in Singapore, to announce upgrades to its machines. The company said future dispensers would include individually wrapped straws and compartments that unlock only after a purchase has been completed.