Food Safety Week 2009
All this week – from the 15th to the 21st of July – is Food Safety week; promoting the importance of good food hygiene in the home. This year the focus is on food hygiene advice for the over 60s; a group that are particularly vulnerable, especially to the perils of food poisoning that arises from failure to store and handle food correctly.
As you may or may not be aware, there has recently been an abnormally high rise in reported amounts of Listeria; a bacterium commonly found in soil, stream water and sewage – as well as food. These bacteria cause a potentially lethal infection called listeriosis, the mortality rate for which is up to twenty-five times higher than that of salmonella! Capable of spreading to the nervous system to cause meningitis and growing in temperatures as low as that in most refrigerators, Listeria is also found in uncooked foods, unpasturised milk and even processed food!
It may not look like a killer…but it is!
It may not look like a killer…but it is!
The key to killing Listeria is by cooking food (or pasturising milk); hence much of the Listeria found in food is due to contamination after cooking and before packaging. For this reason, it is imperative that everybody – especially people at greater risk from Listeria – are informed about the importance of effective food sanitation. This very blog covers the many principles behind correct storage and cooking of food; following the storage and cooking instructions on the packaging, using food by use-by dates and keeping uncooked food away from cooked food being the basics.
Since 2001, the number of cases of listeriosis has doubled in the over 60s – making it responsible for more deaths each year than E.coli and salmonella combined! In an effort to lead the fight against this bacteria, Food Safety Week 2009 is promoting the 4 Cs of Food Hygiene; cooking, cleaning, chilling and cross-contamination. Teach them well!
