Officials in Hanoi have been working with parents to teach their children not to accept food and drinks from strangers or eat snacks outside the school gates, where students are at risk of being poisoned by food of unknown origin.

Dang Thanh Phong, Head of the Hanoi Food Safety Department, said that from now until the end of the year, food safety management will be further strengthened. The city will focus on implementing the "Strengthening Food Safety Control at School Gates in Hanoi" plan for educational institutions.

"Hanoi will review and compile statistics on school kitchens and canteens, as well as investigate, review, and update food service establishments, street vendors, and grocery stores that sell packaged food and ready-to-eat processed food near school gates," Phong said.

Hanoi's Interdisciplinary Inspection Team No. 1 on Food Safety and Hygiene inspects the kitchen of a school in the city. Photo: Hanoi Food Safety Department

He added that the local authorities will conduct food safety inspections in and around school gates, focusing on high-risk food groups, ready-to-eat food and beverages, and ready-to-eat food establishments.

According to Dr. Nguyen Trong Hung of the National Institute of Nutrition, consuming food of unknown origin can cause acute symptoms, including abdominal pain, diarrhea, digestive disorders, food poisoning, and others.

"Consuming these toxic foods for a long time will affect the body's metabolism and make it susceptible to cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and obesity. Chemicals, pesticides, and growth stimulants left in the food will accumulate in the body and cause cancer," Hung said.

Many shop owners cannot prove the origin of the sweets sold at school gates, while most children are attracted to the eye-catching food with sour and spicy taste, partly because the food is extremely cheap. Despite being warned by their families and schools, they still eat and drink these foods, ignoring the unpredictable consequences.

To protect children from the risk of food poisoning at the school gate, Dr. Nguyen Trong An, former Deputy Director of the Department of Child Protection and Care under the Ministry of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs, recommended that the most important thing is for parents to educate children to eat at home and to ask them not to eat snacks.

"Parents should always be on guard and help their children avoid this risk by teaching them to distinguish between clean and dirty food, as well as trustworthy food stores and establishments that do not guarantee food safety," An said, adding that schools should advise parents not to eat street food that lacks food safety certifications or commitments.

The Hanoi Department of Education has asked schools to strongly educate students not to eat food of unknown origin. Teachers and parents should educate their children not to eat snacks outside the school gates and not to accept food and drinks from strangers.

The Hanoi Food Safety Department has recently received information about an incident involving some students of Binh Minh Secondary School in the outlying district of Thanh Oai.

The Hanoi Food Safety Department reported that on September 30, at the gate of Binh Minh Secondary School, a group of strangers distributed free boncha tea with honey and peach flavor to 263 students. After drinking it, a 12-year-old student from Class 6A had symptoms of abdominal pain in the navel area and nausea. School staff took the student to the communal health center and Thanh Oai General Hospital. On the same day, the hospital received 12 other patients with symptoms of headache, dizziness, nausea, and vomiting from Binh Minh Secondary School. They were diagnosed with food poisoning.

Students suffering from food poisoning are treated at the Thanh Oai District General Hospital in Hanoi. Photo courtesy of the hospital.

The investigation revealed that the products used by the students were Boncha tea, flavored with honey and peach, and C2 drink, flavored with guava and passion fruit. The authorities confiscated 234 bottles of Boncha and two bottles of C2. Of these, 98 bottles were used. The district's interdisciplinary inspection team sealed the bottles and handed them over to Thanh Oai District police.

The analysis of these samples showed that they contained Clositridium perdringens; coliforms, E.coli, Pseudomanas aeruginosa. Therefore, the cause of the children's hospitalization was not poisoning from drinking the soft drinks.

A representative from the Thanh Oai District Health Facility explained that the students' symptoms of nausea, headache, dizziness, and stomach pain after consuming free soft drinks may have been caused by excessive consumption.

"When you take in too much sugar or carbohydrate, the pancreas works hard to produce insulin to help break down sugar and regulate blood sugar. A sudden drop in blood sugar causes hypoglycemia, which leads to symptoms such as nausea, stomach pain, fatigue, shakiness, dizziness, mood swings, and headaches," the facility said.

Although medical experts have warned of the risk of poisoning when students eat food of unknown origin from strangers outside the school gates, similar incidents have occurred in Hanoi.

Earlier, on their way to school, eleven students from Nguyen Quy Duc Secondary School in Nam Tu Liem District had eaten sweets of unknown origin. About forty-five minutes later, the students were exhausted, suffering from headaches and nausea.

In other places, there have been several cases of food poisoning caused by eating food of unknown origin outside the school gates. At present, many kinds of snacks and soft drinks of unknown origin are widely sold at many school gates. This is a difficult problem to control in Hanoi and throughout the country.

Street food, including snacks sold at school gates, is often contaminated with bacteria such as E. coli - a type of bacteria that causes diarrhea, intestinal disease, and cholera. Worryingly, snacks sold from mobile carts are difficult to control.

The scene of students huddled around snack carts at school gates is a familiar one. Dishes such as fried sausages, mixed rice paper, shaken potatoes, or colorful soft drinks attract students not only for their convenience but also for their affordable prices. But behind the appeal of these dishes lies a disturbing reality about food safety.