The temporary detention of Mr. Nguyen Thanh Phong - former Director of the Department of Food Safety of the Ministry of Health, along with many department-level officials and specialists, is shocking public opinion.
Shocked not only by the seriousness of bribery, but also by the invisible but terrible harm in eroding people's trust in public health institutions.
It is difficult to accept the fact that the Director of the Food Safety Department of the Ministry of Health - the leader of the agency should be the first route to protect the health of the public health, turning themselves into a "license printing house" for businesses that cheat, harm the health of the people and the race.
Fake functional foods, which are already a danger, become even more toxic when wrapped in a "declared quality" cover, " meeting GMP standards", "licensed by the Ministry of Health".
Fake is not in a laboratory, but in the licensing process - where signatures are purchased for money, not for scientific testing.
This cannot be called just a "individual violation" or "a few pets". Because those pests have eaten deep into the management mechanism, where businesses can "lobby" to get feedback on how to deal with it, and even " get a license first and fix it later".
That is the loosening of post-inspections, suspending forms of pre-inspections, creating deadly loopholes in pharmaceutical and food market supervision.
The question is how many hospitals, pharmacies, and family dining tables have been squeezed into hundreds of products that are "backed" by a series of fake licenses? How many elderly people, cancer patients, malnourished children... have consumed products "guaranteed" by the Food Safety Department's seal, while the stamp creator has ignored the illegal money?
The temporary detention of Mr. Nguyen Thanh Phong - former Director of the Department of Food Safety of the Ministry of Health on charges of accepting bribes related to the fake food ring is a punch that not only targets people's health but also directly affects the trust in the safety of the health system.
This case shows that the licensing and post-inspection system of the medical industry, especially the group of functional foods and health protection foods, is having serious loopholes.
Therefore, handling violators is necessary, but not enough. The authorities need to expand comprehensive inspection of product declaration processes, post-factory inspection, GMP certification... which are gradually being manipulated by interest groups as pointed out in the incident.
In particular, just as it has done with the fields of inspection, examination, land... before, for this reason, the health sector also needs a "clean campaign" for licensing processes for functional foods in particular and new drugs in general to handle them all at once for good.
Only then can trust be restored, and public health can return to its rightful position: a place to protect life, not supporting business people at risk of disease and people's lives.
