BỒI THƯỜNG KHI NGỘ ĐỘC THỰC PHẨM / COMPENSATION UPON FOOD POISONING

Situation: I had food poisoning and had to be hospitalized for 02 days for the treatment as I bought food from the A stall, the food was manufactured and sold by the own stall. In this case, does the A stall have responsibility for compensation to me? 

Response:

Point a, clause 2 Article 7 of the Law on food safety 2010 stipulates that the food producers have obligations to comply with conditions for food safety assurance, assure food safety in the process of production, and take responsibility for the safety of food they produce; get compensations for damage under law upon unsafe food produced by food producers. 

Point a clause 2 Article 8 of the Law on food safety 2010 also stipulates that food traders have obligations to comply with conditions for food safety assurance in the course of trading and take responsibility for the safety of food they trade in; concurrently, they shall pay compensations under law for damages caused by unsafe food they trade in. 

Clause 5 Article 53 of this Law also provides that suppliers of poisoning foods shall pay all medical treatment expenses for poisoned persons and pay compensation under the civil law. Or under clause 5 Article 4 of the Law on protection of consumers also determines the rights of the consumers as entitled to request traders to compensate for damages if products or goods contain defects or products, goods or services fail to conform to standards or technical regulations, fail to satisfy regulations on safety, measurements, quantity, weight, quality, uses or prices or other regulations as prescribed by law or are inconsistent with those registered, announced, posted, advertised, introduced, agreed or declared by traders. 

Accordingly, the law has clarified compensation responsibilities of units producing and trading foods and the consumers’ rights entitled to request compensation for damages due to violation of acts in production and business operations of such units. 

Pursuant to Article 584 of the Civil Code 2015, the grounds giving rise to liability to compensate for damage in this case belonged to A stall when it meets 4 factors: Actual damages incurred (you were hospitalized for 02 days, having medical records and hospital bills); Having violated acts (the foods were not assured safe); Having a causal link between the foods and the poison; Having fault (usually in foods business, the fault is presumed if the goods were not assured safe). 

According to Article 590 of the Civil Code 2015, providing damage caused by harm to health shall comprise: 

Reasonable costs for treating, nursing, and rehabilitating health, and functional losses and impairment of the aggrieved person; 

Loss of or reduction in the actual income of the aggrieved person; if the actual income of the aggrieved person is irregular and is not able to be determined, the average income level for the type of work performed by the aggrieved person shall be applied; 

Reasonable costs and actual income losses of the carers of the aggrieved person during the period of treatment; if the aggrieved person loses his or her ability to work and requires a permanent carer, the damage shall also include reasonable costs for taking care of the aggrieved person; 

Other damage as prescribed by law. 

In addition, the person with responsibilities shall also pay an amount of money as compensation for the mental suffering of the aggrieved person. The amount of compensation for mental suffering shall be as agreed by the parties; if the parties are not able to agree, the maximum sum shall not exceed fifty months' base salary prescribed by the State.