In particular, the City Department of Health directly inspected 226 establishments in the fields of cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, medical equipment and medical examination and treatment. As a result, 41 facilities were handled with a total fine of more than VND 2.27 billion. The special working group of the department alone handled 3 establishments, including 2 establishments violating advertising and 1 establishment trading in goods of unknown origin, with a total fine of more than 572 million VND.
The health departments of localities in Ho Chi Minh City also inspected 1,059 medical and pharmaceutical establishments, thereby fining 14 establishments with a total amount of nearly 170 million VND.
The medical equipment sector continues to be a hot spot, recently, the City Department of Health has issued 17 decisions to revoke 364 announcements of standards applied to type A and B medical equipment, mainly due to violations in product announcement such as hand washing gel, blood sugar meter, massage machine, gynecological cleaning solution, ENT care tools, etc. Many products are misclassified or self-deduce the risk level to facilitate circulation or win the bid.
Notably, through reviewing hospitals and medical centers, the City Department of Health has not detected fake or poor quality medical equipment. However, the situation of taking advantage of self-declared mechanisms to reduce the risk of classifying medical equipment still occurs in some enterprises, causing many devices in group C or D to be "transformed" into group A or B to deceive management agencies.
To tighten management in the coming time, the Department of Health has proposed 5 key groups of solutions: Strengthening human resources and improving the capacity of the team in charge of managing medical device declaration records; Completing the Medical Equipment Classification Advisory Council; Applying digital transformation and artificial intelligence in inspection and supervision; Strengthening training and dissemination of laws on medical equipment classification for businesses; Strengthening post-inspection and strictly punishing cases of intentional violations.
These efforts demonstrate Ho Chi Minh City's determination to protect public health and ensure the legitimate rights of businesses operating in accordance with the law.
