The sale on the local market of some 15,000 products without their Health Registry has motivated the Ministry of Public Health authorities to implement a drive to seize any articles that are outside the law. No businesses will be excluded, although there will be a greater focus in Chinatown, where it is suspected that thousands of products are being sold without any type of health certificates, mostly food items.
Starting now, the deputy minister of environmental health is pulling in all food producers, as well as importers, to urge them to ensure their papers are up to date, according to the General Health Law 42-01, since besides the seizures, sanctions will be applied, and in extreme cases they may even face lawsuits. “We have made a call to businesses and importers to make sure that they are up to date, we know that some permits are expired because of so many requirements, but other are due to laziness,” said Dr. Roberto Berroa, the deputy Minister of Environmental Health. He said that he has met with the Wholesale Food and Drink Importers Association in order to deal with the issue of the permits and find a solution to some of the stumbling blocks that can make it more difficult to acquire Health Certificates.