Importance of Food Safety Training

Importance of food safety training in any food handling business is significant. Both consumers and those working in the hospitality and retail sectors are becoming more aware of the importance of food safety and implementation of HACCP based procedures. Part of the reason for this is when there is an incident of food poisoning, a large number of people may be affected resulting in serious legal issues, negative publicity and loss of livelihood. Owing to this, some businesses might be forced to close down.

 

Why is it Important to Train People in Safe Food Handling

It is the legal responsibility of everyone involved in the food sector to carry out their food-related activities in a hygienic manner. This applies to all food handling areas. In summary, these include food service, food wholesaling, food retailing and food processing. Each year there are 4000 – 5000 reported cases of food poisoning in the island of Ireland. However, the actual figure may be considerably higher than this. This is owing to many people with mild symptoms do not report these symptoms. To illustrate, the FSAI report from 2022 states that there were 4,058 complaints from consumers in 2022. About 1,200 were relating to unfit food and more than 1,100 each due to poor hygiene standards and suspected food poisoning. In other words, food poisoning concerns almost doubled from the 622 received in 2021.

Food poisoning, also called foodborne illness, is illness caused by eating contaminated food. Infectious organisms, including bacteria, viruses and parasites, or their toxins are the most common causes of food poisoning. Infectious organisms or their toxins can contaminate food at any point of processing or production.

To learn more about food poisoning and how to prevent it, the eLearn Safety has developed fully online food safety courses. These courses are designed to introduce participants to food safety and hygiene issues. All courses are based on the training criteria set down by the Food Safety Authority of Ireland’s Guide to Food Safety Training at appropriate level.

On completion of this food safety training course, participants will be able to understand their requirements under Irish food safety legislation as well as following best work practices.

 

Consequences of Poor Food Handling Practices

Food poisoning symptoms, which can start within hours of eating contaminated food, often include nausea, vomiting or diarrhea. Most often, food poisoning is mild and resolves without treatment. However, some people need to go to the hospital. In addition, food poisoning is especially serious and potentially life-threatening for young children, pregnant women and their fetuses, older adults, and people with weakened immune systems.

In any case, to prevent food poisoning, these essential principles should be adhered to:

• Wash your hands, utensils and food surfaces often.
• Keep raw foods separate from ready-to-eat foods.
• Cook foods to a safe temperature.
• Refrigerate or freeze perishable foods promptly.
• Defrost food safely.
• If in doubt, throw it out.

Remember, it is a legal requirement that staff who are involved in a food environment are trained and/or supervised commensurate with their work activity!

 

Online Food Safety Training

Please remember – it is a legal requirement that staff who are involved in a food environment are trained and/or supervised commensurate with their work activity!

Myelearnsafety offers fully online Food Safety (HACCP) courses.

To find out more, please check our Courses page.

Alternatively, should you need any additional information, please do not hesitate to let us know via email info@elearn.ie

 

Allergenic Food Contamination

Allergenic food contamination can produce serious life threatening reactions in some people. Many people are allergic to certain foods, so you must always be aware of all the ingredients contained in the food served by your kitchen. For example, many pre-prepared foodstuffs such as ice cream contain eggs, and other foods contain traces of nuts. Be very careful when garnishing food, because even if a pre-prepared food type is allergen free, if it is garnished with chopped nuts it can become fatal to certain people.

 

Allergen Awareness Training

All members of staff must be trained in Allergen Awareness and observe the house rules. They should be able to recognise the symptoms of an allergic reaction. For a convenient fully online Managing Food Allergens course, please see eLearn Safety course on Managing Food Allergens. It is very important to make sure that food suppliers provide complete ingredient information. This is especially important if any changes to food ingredients are made. The best way to ensure your suppliers are compliant is having a robust and up-to-date Food Safety Management Systems in place. Some useful information can be found in eLearn Safety blog entry from 5th May 2023 titled Food Safety Management System (FSMS).

 

Consequences of Allergenic Food Contamination

Another important task of all food handlers is to listen carefully to customers. If an allergy sufferer asks for information about the ingredients of a certain food, it is essential that all involved in the food business have allergenic food contamination awareness so they can give an accurate response to their customers.

Naturally, there are some food handling establishments whose unique selling point is food that are classified as allergenic. Examples of such establishments are restaurants that serve sea food or dishes containing nuts. The most important word here is awareness – all staff must be aware of food ingredients in each dish. Likewise, customers must be aware that the seafood restaurant will most likely serve fish as a main offering.

Businesses cannot claim they don’t know what allergens are in the food they are serving or use ‘blanket-cover all’ expressions ‘food may contain allergens’ for all food they serve.

 

Anaphylactic Shock Symptoms

Allergic food contamination is a serious issue as allergies can cause an anaphylactic shock. Anaphylactic shock is life-threatening.

The symptoms include:

• Reddening of the skin, swelling of the lips and eyelids.
• Swelling of the throat, difficulty breathing and/or speaking.
• Feeling faint due to a serious drop in blood pressure.
• Nausea.
• Collapse and unconsciousness.

If someone suffers these symptoms, immediate medical attention must be provided. In addition, calling an ambulance is a must.

 

Allergenic Food Contamination – Food Allergens

There are 14 allergens that must be declared by law. These are:

1. Cereals containing gluten – wheat (such as spelt and khorasan wheat), rye, barley, oats. Note: The cereal name, e.g., ‘wheat’, must be declared and highlighted, not ‘gluten’.
2. Crustaceans, e.g., crabs, prawns, lobsters.
3. Eggs.
4. Fish.
5. Peanuts.
6. Soybeans.
7. Milk.
8. Nuts (almonds, hazelnuts, walnuts, cashews, pecan nuts, brazil nuts, pistachio nuts, macademia/Queensland nut). Note: The name of the nut, e.g., ‘almond’, must be declared and highlighted, not ‘nuts’.
9. Celery.
10. Mustard.
11. Sesame seeds.
12. Sulphur dioxide and sulphites (at concentrations of more than 10 mg/kg or 10 mg/L in terms of total sulphur dioxide) – used as a preservative.
13. Lupin.
14. Molluscs e.g., mussels, oysters, squid, snails.

The Food Safety Authority of Ireland published useful information in relation to Food Allergens on their web page titled Food Allergens – Advice for Consumers.

 

Online Food Safety Training

Please remember – it is a legal requirement that staff who are involved in a food environment are trained and/or supervised commensurate with their work activity!

Myelearnsafety offers fully online Food Safety (HACCP) courses.

To find out more, please check our Courses page.

Alternatively, should you need any additional information, please do not hesitate to let us know via email info@elearn.ie

Spores and Toxins in Food

Spores and toxins in food can be a cause of a serious food poisoning. Spores are a bacteria’s survival package. Some bacteria when faced with adverse conditions such as rising temperatures will form a survival spore. A spore has a protective shell which can withstand higher temperatures than those reached in cooking.

 

Spores in Food

Water boils at 100°C. This means that most of cooking will be only a little hotter. However, spores can survive temperatures of up to 120°C. When the heat returns to room temperature, the spore opens.  Once this happens, the bacteria starts growing to form another colony. This is why hot holding at temperatures above 63°C prevents spores become active, whereas rapid cooling does not give a chance to spores to open.

Two common spore-forming bacteria are Clostridium perfringens and Bacillus cereus. Some foods such as red kidney beans simply need to be cooked to break down the toxins and render them harmless.

 

Toxins in Food

Some toxins are produced by careless defrosting food (e.g. scombrotoxin). Toxins are poisons that are produced by bacteria and plants. Toxins can be deadly, such as that produced by Clostridium botulinum. The verocytotoxin produced by E. coli and its relatives causes damages to kidneys and the intestine. This may result in death, especially in the elderly and the very young. Seafood can also contain dangerous toxins. One of these toxins can cause paralytic shellfish poisoning (PSP). Paralytic shellfish poisoning as the name suggests, causes paralysis. Shellfish such as mussels feed on smaller animals that produce this toxin. In large groups these animals can be seen as a red bloom known as ‘red tide’. There are monitoring systems such as satellite images, that warn where and when shellfish must not be harvested.

 

Spores and Toxins in Plants

Plants can contain toxins. Some toxins are produced by moulds. These toxins include aflatoxin, which can seriously harm the liver. Such toxins are found in cereals and dried fruits that have been poorly stored. All these examples demonstrate the importance of always obtaining quality food from reputable suppliers.

 

Preventing Food Poisoning

• There are 4 simple steps to prevent food poisoning. As SafeFood writes in their article Food poisoning: causes, symptoms and treatment, steps you can take to prevent food poisoning are:
  Clean – always wash your hands before and after handling and eating food, after visiting the toilet or playing with pets or animals.
  Cook – make sure that food is thoroughly cooked in order to destroy any harmful bacteria that might be present.
  Chill – keep food cool in order to prevent bad bacteria from growing; make sure that your fridge is at the correct temperature to keep cold foods chilled – aim to keep your fridge at 5°C or below.
  Prevent cross-contamination – separate raw and cooked foods during storage and cooking and never let raw food, for example raw meat, come into contact with food that is ready-to-eat.

 

Online Food Safety Training

Please remember – it is a legal requirement that staff who are involved in a food environment are trained and/or supervised commensurate with their work activity!

Myelearnsafety offers fully online Food Safety (HACCP) courses.

To find out more, please check our Courses page.

Alternatively, should you need any additional information, please do not hesitate to let us know via email info@elearn.ie

Hand Washing for Food Handlers

Hand washing for food handlers is an essential aspect of cleanliness and hygiene. When it comes to food hazards, food handlers are potentially one of the biggest risks in terms of food safety. However, to extend this, hand washing is not important only in a food preparing environment, but in a domestic one as well.

 

Hand Washing at Home

According to a research by BMC Public Health, Denmark tops the ranking when hand hygiene of consumers is looked into. According to a study Hand hygiene practices during meal preparation—a ranking among ten European countries, the ranking is as follows: Denmark, Greece, Norway, Romania, Hungary, Germany, UK, Portugal, France, and Spain. However, the overall conclusion of the study was that the hand washing is often done incorrectly by skipping areas of hand when washing, or washing one’s hands not long enough. Unfortunately, this is also true when handling risky food such as raw chicken. According to the study, the young families and pregnant women are most likely to neglect a proper hand washing technique. On the other hand, the elderly individuals generally do not wash their hands when required.

 

Hand Washing for Food Handlers – Why is it Important

Most likely, the single most important activity in the food preparation area is proper hand washing. Hands are used for everything – scratching your nose, touching your phone, keys, emptying bins, handling cash, and finally touching the food that is being prepared. It is incredibly easy to cross-contaminate food just by using unwashed hands.

Food workers have a moral and legal responsibility to ensure that they do not contaminate food. One of the characteristics of a good food worker is a positive attitude towards hygiene and a willingness to help maintain a high standard at the workplace. Hand washing is at the top of hygiene importance.

Food hygiene legislation places a legal responsibility on food workers, proprietors and visitors to maintain a high degree of personal cleanliness.

Keep the body clean – Food workers should wash or shower daily to remove the layers of dirt, dead skin, sweat and bacteria that build up on the body which can be passed onto food.

The law requires that:

• Food workers are required to maintain a high degree of personal cleanliness and wear suitable clean clothes, and, if necessary, protective clothing.
• It is an offense for an employee of a food business to fail to comply with Annex II of the Regulation EC no. 852/2004 (on the hygiene of foodstuffs).

Want to learn more? Explore eLearn Safety fully online Food Safety (HACCP) Level 1 course.

 

When to Wash Hands

Hands can never be washed too often, but they can be washed not often enough. This is especially important when hand washing for food handlers is in question. Always aim to wash your hands:

• Before changing into work clothes to avoid transferring dirt and bacteria onto them.
• Before handling food of any type.
• After handling one type of food and before handling something else, especially after handling raw meat, poultry, seafood, raw eggs and dairy.
• After cleaning surfaces, utensils or any equipment.
• After handling waste.
• After handling money.
• After blowing your nose.
• After coughing or sneezing.
• After touching hair or face.
• After going to the toilet.
• After eating, drinking or smoking.

The main point to take is – Wash Your Hands regularly!

 

Hand Washing for Food Handlers – How To Steps

Hands must be washed at a wash hand basin supplied with running hot and cold water. Liquid bacterial soap and an approved means of hand drying should be used. The hands, front and back and the gap between the thumb and forefinger must be washed using a rubbing action. It is not satisfactory to run fingers under the tap and then to dry hands on uniforms.

• Hands should be thoroughly dried.
• Separate sinks need to be available for hand washing!
• The correct way to wash your hands:
• If required, make sure your sleeves are pulled up or turned up and they don’t cover your wrists.
• Wet your hands under warm running water.
• Use enough soap to form a good lather, and soap all parts of your hand, fingers and thumbs right up to the wrist.
• Keep washing your hands for about 20 seconds.
• Rinse your hands under running water until they are free of all traces of lather. Use fingers to help remove the suds.
• Turn off the tap with an elbow or paper towel.
• Dry hands thoroughly using fresh paper towels.

To learn more watch the below video prepared by SafeFood.net titled How to wash your hands properly.

 

Hand Washing for Food Handlers – Why Does it Matter?

Hand washing for food handlers is extremely important as correct hand washing will remove bacteria such as E. Coli and salmonella. Bacteria on the hands have an ideal environment, They have food, moisture and a temperature of around 37°C allowing speedy reproduction and a higher risk of infection. This is why hands must be kept meticulously clean at all times.

 

Online Food Safety Training

Please remember – it is a legal requirement that staff who are involved in a food environment are trained and/or supervised commensurate with their work activity!

Myelearnsafety offers fully online Food Safety (HACCP) courses.

To find out more, please check our Courses page.

Alternatively, should you need any additional information, please do not hesitate to let us know via email info@elearn.ie