Do not underestimate consumer health

Kera candy of Chi Em Rot Group Joint Stock Company caused a stir after advertising “one candy is equivalent to a plate of vegetables”. A consumer sent Kera candy for testing and discovered that the fiber content was very low, completely different from the advertisement. Authorities from central to local levels have stepped in and discovered many violations by this company. On April 3, the Investigation Police Agency, Ministry of Public Security initiated a case of “Production of counterfeit food products” and “Deception of customers”.

Kera candy is a food supplement, so the company will self-declare and take responsibility for the product. The responsibility for post-inspection belongs to the management agency - the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Food Safety. However, only when the scandal occurs, this agency will inspect and discover violations such as: products with nutritional values ​​inconsistent with the information that the company self-declare, products containing sorbitol but not shown on the label; product labels are not in accordance with regulations.

The question is, if consumers did not proactively test Kera candy, would the authorities have intervened and the matter would have come to a head as it is now? Clearly, consumers are very aware of their own rights and the community’s, especially with products related to health. This is also a strong warning about the responsibility of celebrities when advertising products in this field.

In fact, the Vietnamese market for dietary supplements (food supplements, health protection foods, medical nutritional foods) has grown very strongly in recent times. The whole country has more than 3,100 manufacturing facilities supplying the market with nearly 12,000 dietary supplement products, not to mention countless hand-carried dietary supplements, bought and sold online...

Due to ineffective management, consumers are still lost in the “matrix” of dietary supplements. In recent years, hospitals have also received many patients with serious complications due to the use of poor quality dietary supplements or those mixed with banned substances, or even replacing medicines. And to date, no one has taken responsibility for these patients.

The above situation needs to be seriously studied, as a basis for naming and shaming low-quality products, and dealing with dishonest traders who disregard consumers’ health. The Kera vegetable candy case is a “hot” warning for those who are helping dishonest traders, profiting from the trust of the community.

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Source: https://www.sggp.org.vn/dung-coi-thuong-suc-khoe-nguoi-tieu-dung-post789371.html