Increase in food poisoning cases, diễn biến is still complicated
On the morning of April 16, the Inter-sectoral Steering Committee for Food Safety of Ho Chi Minh City organized a launching ceremony for the 2026 Action Month for Food Safety with the theme "Ensuring food safety, preventing food poisoning in food services and street food", lasting until May 15.
Minister of Health Dao Hong Lan said that Ho Chi Minh City is a densely populated center with a large trade flow, and also a place to proactively and effectively implement a food safety assurance model.
Food safety is an urgent issue, directly affecting people's health, race quality and socio-economic development. Therefore, this is an important task in people's health care.
Over the past time, many activities and solutions have been implemented, but the actual developments are still complicated. In the first quarter of 2026, the number of food poisoning cases nationwide increased by 20 cases compared to the same period, of which cases with over 30 people affected accounted for about 25%. This shows that this is a hot issue, requiring stronger solutions.
Vice Chairman of Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee Nguyen Manh Cuong said that after the merger of administrative units, the city currently has a scale of more than 14 million people with 168 communes, wards, and special zones. Larger scale, wider space leads to greater tasks, while food safety management still faces many difficulties and challenges. Despite efforts, food poisoning cases still occur, and the risk of unsafety is still latent.
Mr. Nguyen Manh Cuong requested agencies and localities to focus on promoting propaganda to raise social awareness, especially the responsibility of food production and business establishments; strengthen inspection, examination, and supervision; and at the same time strengthen close and smooth coordination between agencies and localities from city to grassroots levels...
Tighten control over food services and street food
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Pham Khanh Phong Lan - Director of Ho Chi Minh City Department of Food Safety said that from the beginning of 2026 to now, the city continues to record cases of food insecurity, suspected food poisoning and after verification, food poisoning, especially at schools and street food such as bread.
According to Ms. Phong Lan, street food and catering services are a difficult group to control, from raw materials, additives, chemicals to professional habits. Just one loose step can lead to serious consequences.
In the action month, the unit focuses on 3 groups of tasks: raising awareness, strengthening propaganda for people and practitioners; strengthening inspection, supervision, handling violations and publicizing results to create deterrence, review, and strictly manage food production and business establishments according to risk assessment; proactively preventing food poisoning.
Ms. Phong Lan also noted that there is still a situation of slow handling and investigation. When the incident occurred, it received great public attention, but then the penalty was no longer noticed because there were other new cases, reducing efficiency.
When food poisoning occurs, it is a failure, because it is a consequence of a prevention process that we have not done well, not blaming anyone. Therefore, we review, strengthen training, inspect schools, establishments providing ready-to-eat meals for schools and strengthen information sources to handle it promptly" - Ms. Lan emphasized.
When a suspected food poisoning incident occurs, the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Food Safety closely coordinates with the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Health in investigating, taking samples, and determining the cause. Based on the professional assessment of the health sector, functional agencies complete dossiers and handle them in accordance with regulations.
