Fines and temporary suspension of student dining facilities that violate food safety regulations

On January 4, the Lao Cai Provincial Department of Health informed that at around 5:30 p.m. on December 12, 2023, 171 students had dinner at the Lao Cai College canteen, including stir-fried white radish, fried chicken, fried sausage, fish cakes with tomato sauce, white rice, and chrysanthemum greens soup.

The police issued a fine and temporarily closed the food and beverage facilities for students who violated food safety regulations, picture 1. — The inspection team of the Lao Cai Province Food Safety and Hygiene Department worked with the owner of a food business establishment at the Lao Cai College canteen (Photo provided by Lao Cai Department of Health).

Afterwards, some students had symptoms such as stomach ache, nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea.

From 9:00 p.m. the same day to the morning of December 13, 2023, 4 students were admitted to Lao Cai Provincial General Hospital for examination, monitoring and treatment, while the remaining 6 students monitored their health at the school dormitory and did not go to the hospital. On the morning of December 18, 2023, all students admitted to Lao Cai Provincial General Hospital for monitoring and treatment were discharged and their health was stable.

The Lao Cai Provincial Food Safety and Hygiene Department (Lao Cai Department of Health) conducted an investigation and verification at Lao Cai Provincial General Hospital and inspected the canteen of Lao Cai College located at Group 5, Binh Minh Ward, Lao Cai City, Lao Cai Province, owned by Ms. Hoang Thi T. and collected 4 samples of food ingredients (Super Chef sausage, pre-processed chicken, pre-processed fish cakes, white radish) and 6 food samples kept by the facility for the dinner on December 12, 2023 and the morning of December 13, 2023 (fried chicken, fried sausage, fish cakes with tomato sauce, chrysanthemum greens soup, stir-fried radish, buttered bread with shredded pork); 1 sample of the specimen for testing.

The police issued a fine and temporarily closed the food and beverage facilities for students who violated food safety regulations, picture 2. — The inspection team of the Lao Cai Province Food Safety and Hygiene Department worked with the owner of a food business establishment at the Lao Cai College canteen (Photo provided by Lao Cai Department of Health).

The results showed that the pre-processed fish cake sample used as the raw material for making tomato sauce fish cake had two types of bacteria detected: B. cereus with a content of 103 CFU/g and S.aureus with a content of 1.3 x 103 CFU/g.

Through investigation, verification of medical records at Lao Cai Provincial General Hospital, on-site inspection at the canteen and test results... Lao Cai Provincial Food Safety and Hygiene Department determined that this was a food safety incident suspected to be caused by bacterial toxins.

Through inspection at Lao Cai College's canteen, it was found that the facility did not collect and treat waste and garbage within the scope of the food service business according to the provisions of law (waste in the food preparation and processing area was not collected, and there was also animal feces in the kitchen toilet due to the facility's captivity).

Lao Cai Provincial Department of Health has decided to administratively fine Ms. Hoang Thi T. (school canteen) for 7 million VND and suspend the facility's operations for 1 month from the date of receiving the penalty decision.

Pham Ngoc Trien

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