Food
Hygiene is one of the most serious issues facing the food industry in the
world, with negative impacts on customers and restaurant owners as well.
Infections from food corruption are spreading rapidly and infect individuals
with many diseases, some of which are deadly.
In the
worst-case scenario, these diseases are spreading rapidly in mass food
preparation sites in hotels, large restaurants, hospitals, and cruise ships. In
these cases, the infection is collective, and sometimes leads to the closure of
the facilities themselves until the source of infection.
Efficiency
in dealing with these cases depends on the extent of medical resources
available to deal with mass food poisoning cases and the speed of response and
the efficiency of training workers in infected facilities to identify and treat
these cases. In Europe, all catering outlets are subject to certain hygiene
requirements in the preparation and delivery of foods, including training for
staff, site inspection and issuance of health validity certificates, which must
be renewed every three years. No restaurant can serve its meals without a valid
hygiene certificate.
- While traveling:
The risk
of food contamination increases when traveling, not because food in other
countries are less clean, but because the body is not used to it. The most
important sources of contamination are not from food but from drinking water,
including the addition of ice to drinks.
- 10 rules for food hygiene:
WHO
experts believe that there are several factors related to how foods are handled
that often leads to a large proportion of food corruption. The most important
factors are the preparation of food several hours before eating and keeping it
at temperatures that help the growth of bacteria, and not cook or reheat enough
food, infection, and transmission between foods and lack of personal hygiene for
those who prepare foods.
The
organization has issued what it considers 10 golden rules to deal with these
risks and demands that they be applied when preparing food for private or
public consumption anywhere in the world regardless of prevailing social and
cultural factors. These rules are:
- Necessity of choosing foods that promote hygiene, such as buying pasteurized milk instead of natural milk. Wash fresh vegetables.
- Complete cooking of foods: Some foods such as meat, chicken, and eggs may be infected with germs. And complete cooking saves its from these germs.
- You should eat cooked food once cooked. Bacteria grow in these foods as soon as their temperature declines.
- Take Care when storing foods. This is above 63 ° C or below 10 ° C. Baby foods should not be preserved but replaced by fresh ones.
- Make sure to reheat foods well. The temperature in these cases should not be less than 70 ° C.
- Confusion between uncooked and cooked foods should be avoided. This includes not using the kitchen countertop in cutting raw meat and then cooked meat.
- The need to wash hands periodically: before preparing food and after dealing with uncooked meat.
- Clean the surfaces of food preparation in the kitchens and clean between the processes of preparing different foods, including towels cleaning dishes that must be changed periodically and boiled before reuse.
- Protecting foods from pests and insects that cause poisoning and diseases.
- Clean water is necessary to prepare clean food. Drinking water should be used in food preparation or boiling before use.