On November 24, the Ministry of Health sent an official dispatch to the Ministries of Agriculture and Rural Development, Industry and Trade, Finance and the People's Committees of provinces / cities directly under the Central Government on the implementation of the measures. control of food imported from countries with outbreaks of COVID-19.
Accordingly, at present, the epidemic of COVID-19 in the world continues to be complicated, some countries have detected a new strain of corona virus (SARS-CoV-2) on food product packaging. Frozen.
Although Vietnam has initially successfully controlled this disease, the risk of transmitting the disease into Vietnam is very great.
In order to strengthen prevention measures and prevent the risk of entering the COVID-19 epidemic into Vietnam, the Ministry of Health - Standing in the standing of the Central Inter-Agency Steering Committee on Food Safety, proposed to the Ministry of Agriculture and Development. In rural areas, the Ministry of Industry and Trade, the Ministry of Finance (the General Department of Customs), the People's Committees of centrally-affiliated cities / provinces instruct the authorities to take strict control measures on food imported from countries with COVID-19 epidemics (especially frozen foods); t burning out sampling on the packaging for the SARS-CoV virus tests-2 for food and report the results to the Health Ministry.
At the same time, to strengthen propaganda for food importers on measures to prevent COVID-19 epidemics and strictly comply with the directions of the Prime Minister, the National Steering Committee for COVID- 19 on the implementation of COVID-19 epidemic prevention activities.
Previously, at the online conference to strengthen the prevention and control of COVID-19 in the new situation on November 24, Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long also said that another source of infection has a high risk of COVID- 19 that is from imported foods, especially chilled foods.
Therefore, the Minister said that the Interagency Steering Committee on food safety will also plan and implement the monitoring and testing of imported food.
The Ministry of Health has requested relevant agencies to test COVID-19 for imported frozen foods, because the viability of viruses on these products is very long.