WHO / Yoshi Shimizu
A WHO field staff talks to a woman fetching water from a water catchment tank in Kiribati.

Food safety in Viet Nam

Access to sufficient amounts of safe and healthy food is key to sustaining life and promoting good health. However, unsafe food containing harmful bacteria, viruses, parasites or chemical substances can cause more than 200 diseases – ranging from diarrhoea to cancers.

Examples of unsafe food include uncooked foods of animal origin, fruits and vegetables contaminated with faeces, and raw shellfish containing marine biotoxins.

An estimated 600 million – almost 1 in 10 people in the world – fall ill after eating contaminated food, and 420 000 die every year. Diarrhoeal diseases are the most common illnesses resulting from the consumption of contaminated food, causing 550 million people to fall ill and 230 000 deaths every year. Children under 5 years of age carry 40% of the foodborne disease burden, with 125 000 deaths every year.

Foodborne diseases

From 2011 to 2016, on average, there were 668,673 foodborne disease cases, and 21 deaths per year. In addition, during the same period, 1 007 food poisoning outbreaks with 30 395 food poisoning cases had been reported.

Food safety policies in Viet Nam

In Viet Nam, the report from National Assembly on monitoring of the implementation of policies and law on food safety showed that from 2011 to 2016, seven foodborne diseases were identified – with 4 012 038 cases, of which 123 were fatalities.