10,000 cans of Ensure milk had their labels switched.

A batch of milk of unknown origin with counterfeit and altered Ensure labels that Hue City Police are seizing - Photo: TRUNG HOANG

According to the police, Hue City Police caught Ms. Ton Nu Cam Dung red-handed changing the label of 237ml Ensure milk at her private home at 8/358 Phan Chu Trinh. The police drew up a report and temporarily seized 5,208 yellow-labeled Ensure milk cans, 1,680 blue-labeled cans, and 505 unlabeled cans.

Also at Ms. Dung's house, the police temporarily seized 50 cartons of 237ml Ensure milk with their yellow labels removed, replaced with blue ones, and without labels.

At the same time, the police also inspected and confiscated 60 cartons of Ensure milk in cans and 237ml bottles at Mr. Nguyen Quang Sanh's house (35 Nguyen Thien Thuat); inspected and confiscated 24 cartons of Ensure milk in 237ml bottles with 720 blue plastic bottles at Mr. Phan Van Be's house (95 Tran Nguyen Dan). Both Mr. Sanh and Mr. Be were unable to present invoices or documents proving the origin of the milk.

At the police station, the subjects initially confessed that since November 2011, they were hired by a person named Nguyen Khoi Tin (commonly known as Cu Sua, 32 years old, residing in Ho Chi Minh City) to change the milk label from yellow to blue for 3,000-4,000 VND/carton. The method was to peel off the yellow label by hand and replace it with a blue label. Tin hired a person named Phong (in Ho Chi Minh City) to make the blue Ensure milk label. Tin ordered 2.4 million blue Ensure milk labels printed at a price of 900 VND each and then shipped them to Hue. From November 2011 until now, these subjects have received goods, transported, swapped labels and traded all through direct phone calls with Tin.

The police initially determined that Nguyen Khoi Tin bought milk from Ho Chi Minh City and acted as a “bait” for a milk seller, Minh Dat Phu One Member Co., Ltd. in Da Nang City. Then, Tin hired Nguyen Van Hung (residing at 13/6 Cua Trai, Hue City) to transport yellow Ensure milk to Ms. Dung’s house to change the label from yellow to blue, then distribute it to the Hue market.

Lieutenant Colonel Vo Van Sau - Deputy Chief of Hue City Police - said that the results of the quality assessment of the milk samples from the confiscated batch of Ensure milk were real milk. However, the owner of the milk had committed fraud and deceived consumers by peeling off the entire yellow Ensure milk label and replacing it with a new blue Ensure label.

According to Mr. Sau, a portion of these more than 10,000 cans of milk were cleared through Da Nang City Customs, then transferred to Hue to change the yellow label to blue, and then put on the market. Also according to information from Hue City Police, this type of milk was also purchased from Thailand, brought through Moc Bai (Tay Ninh) and Lao Bao (Quang Tri) border gates, and then brought to Ho Chi Minh City for consumption.

Mr. Phan Van Thanh, deputy head of the Market Management Department of Thua Thien - Hue province, said that since the beginning of the year, the market management force has increased inspection of consumer goods but has not yet discovered any cases of fake Ensure milk being sold.

On April 18, in a written response to the Hue City Police, a representative of Abbott Laboratories SA in Ho Chi Minh City said that Abbott Laboratories SA is the only representative office in Vietnam and so far Abbott has only provided one 237ml liquid Ensure product called Ensure Gold Vigor vanilla flavor.

And this product is registered with the Department of Food Safety and Hygiene (Ministry of Health), imported and officially distributed in the Vietnamese market by 3A Nutrition Company Limited located at Centec Tower (72-74 Nguyen Thi Minh Khai, District 3, HCMC).

According to Tuoi Tre - H