Health protection foods must be granted a registration certificate by the Food Safety Department before being sold.

thực phẩm - Ảnh 1. — The Ministry of Health recommends that functional foods are not drugs and have no therapeutic effect - Photo: DEPARTMENT OF FOOD SAFETY

What is health food?

After the incident of fake milk circulating on the market, many consumers wondered which foods are under the management of the Ministry of Health, and how to know if the product has been accepted for circulation by the authorities.

According to Decree 15, some products must register for product declaration: health protection foods, medical nutritional foods, foods for special diets; nutritional products for children up to 36 months old; mixed food additives with new uses, food additives not on the list of additives permitted for use in food or not for the right users as prescribed by the Ministry of Health.

In particular, the Department of Food Safety, Ministry of Health receives dossiers for health protection foods. Provincial People's Committees receive dossiers for medical nutritional foods, foods for special diets, and nutritional products for children up to 36 months old.

According to regulations, health supplements (Health Supplement, Dietary Supplement) are products used to supplement the daily diet to maintain, enhance, improve the functions of the human body, and reduce the risk of disease.

Health protection foods contain one or more substances or a mixture of the following substances:

+ Vitamins, minerals, amino acids, fatty acids, enzymes, probiotics and other bioactive substances.

+ Substances of natural origin, including animals, minerals and plants in the form of extracts, isolations, concentrates and metabolites.

+ Synthetic sources of the above components.

Health protection foods are presented in processed forms such as capsules, pills, tablets, granules, powders, liquids and other dosage forms and are dosed (for use) into small dose units.

Accordingly, the procedure for registering product declarations for health protection foods is received by the Food Safety Department.

Application for declaration of health protection food products can be submitted via the online public service system; by post or directly to the application receiving agency.

The processing time for health food applications is 21 days.

Thus, when submitting a product declaration dossier, the procedure will be processed within a maximum of 21 days. And after the Food Safety Department issues a certificate of registration, the product declaration can be circulated on the market.

How to look up health food

According to the Food Safety Department, all information about health food products that have been granted a Certificate of Product Declaration Registration and a Certificate of Advertising Content Confirmation is publicly available on the websites https://vfa.gov.vn/, https://dichvucong.moh.gov.vn/ and https://congkhaiyte.moh.gov.vn/?page=Project.MedicalPrice.Home.MedicalPrice.Announcement.list#module9. People can look up information before deciding to buy the product.

The Department also instructs consumers to carefully check product information on the product label or sub-label (for imported products) to ensure that the following information is complete:

- Product name;

- Date of manufacture, expiry date;

- Ingredients, quantitative ingredients;

- Quantitative;

- Instructions for use, storage instructions: Uses, users, how to use; - Warnings about risks (if any);

- Write the phrase: "Health protection food";

- Write the phrase: "This food is not a medicine and cannot replace medicine."

- Product declaration registration receipt number, advertising content confirmation number (if any).

- Name and address of the responsible trader and product manufacturing facility.

When viewing advertisements on social networks, it is important to pay attention to distinguishing signs of violations in advertisements, for example: Drinking health protection foods will cure diseases; or having images of doctors and medical staff introducing the product, without the line "This food is not a medicine and does not have the effect of replacing medicine" are advertising contents that violate the law.

WILLOW

Source: https://tuoitre.vn/thuc-pham-bao-ve-suc-khoe-phai-duoc-cuc-an-toan-thuc-pham-cap-giay-tiep-nhan-dang-ky-moi-duoc-ban-20250420111325728.htm