After the owner of a Russian supermarket chain announced that he would be paying 1 million rubles to each person proven to have gotten food poisoning from the store’s products, many decided to take him up on his offer.

Earlier this month, Yekaterinburg-based supermarket chain Zhiznmart came under fire for allegedly selling compromised food products that had landed at least 18 people in the hospital with food poisoning. As a result, several suppliers refused to work with Zhiznmart anymore for fear of getting audited by Rospotrebnadzor, Russia’s federal agency in charge of consumer wellbeing and protection. Left with empty shells and a sullied reputation, Zhiznmart founder made a bold public statement, promising to compensate each person proven to have been poisoned by his products with 1 million rubles ($11,000). His promise went viral, and before long, people were trying to get food poisoning at Zhiznmart and get compensated.

The Baza Telegram channel was among the first news outlets to report that people had been buying up Zhiznmart’s food products hoping that they would be contaminated enough to guarantee them a payday. Some were so desperate that they resorted to licking eggs right in the supermarket to increase their chances of getting food poisoning.

“As far as I understand, according to the latest information, Rospotrebnadzor and local hospitals are simply inundated by claims of food poisoning related to Zhiznmart without any solid proof, Zhiznmart founder Ivan Zaichenko said. “People complain about everything, about food that was prepared a few days ago in factories that have already been checked and passed all tests, and about food that they ate in April. Unofficially, this is associated with the promised compensation of a million rubles.”

“If we were found guilty in any of the 18 cases currently being investigated by Rospotrebnadzor , I wanted to do good and compensate the people genuinely affected by the problems that we created, but the road to hell is paved with good intentions,” Zaichenko said.

In order to discourage people from coming into his supermarket and trying to get food poisoning, Zaichenko clarified that the only people eligible to receive his compensation 1 million rubles ($11,000) were the 18 ones who had originally been treated for food poisoning. Everyone else would be ignored!

“Please note that we are going to pay compensation to those whom Rospotrebnadzor referred to when starting inspections,” Zaicheno said. “These are 18 people, and we will take these lists from Rospotrebnadzor itself. So please, don’t lick the eggs, it’s dangerous.)