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Monday, December 28, 2009
Holiday Safety
We would like to wish everyone a happy holiday
season and remind you to be safe during this time of gathering with family and friends. It makes for a really bad weekend
when one or more guests succumb to a foodborne illness.
Ways to avoid creating conditions favorable to foodborne
illness are:
Store your cooked (Ready-to-Eat) foods away from or above foods that are raw (such as chicken or fish) to
avoid juices from the raw foods spilling on the foods that are ready to serve.
Always cook your food to the recommended
temperatures.
Be sure to refrigerate your leftovers.
Always reheat leftovers to an internal temperature of
165 degrees Fahrenheit.
Be sure to discard leftovers within an acceptable amount of time.
For more information
on food safety at home check out www.fightbac.org.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
H1N1 at the Office
It is flu season. The President has listed H1N1 as a national emergency
and the CDC (Centers for Disease Control) has called it a pandemic. No one wants to be subjected
to a contagious individual and this is especially true at the office. “I can’t avoid my kids,
but I can avoid Bill in sales.”
A recent survey
by Mansfield Communications found that 91% of employees said co-workers that have flu symptoms should stay at home.
This makes sense, but due to the current economic woes, it is hard for most of us to miss a day at work. Many
of today’s workers are afraid that if they aren’t at the office it could “look bad”.
The same survey by Mansfield also said that 47% of respondents said they would go
out in public to stores and ride public transportation even if they had the H1N1 flu.
The CDC in Atlanta recommends that people with H1N1 flu diagnoses stay home for at least a full week.
Companies should have a policy in place to address this issue and any similar pandemics that may arise in the future.
LMSC can help your HR department develop policies and procedures to address these concerns.
2:33 pm
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Expired or Not Expired...
I recently came across an interesting article posted to the Global Food
Safety Initiative Group on LinkedIn. It seems British Member of Parliament (MP) Hilary Benn who currently serves as that country’s
Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has proposed some radical changes to date codes on food products.
The argument goes that many people are confused by all the different date code standards (Sell by, Use by, Display
Until…etc.), and are throwing away a lot of still edible food. His office estimates that over 370,000
tons of food are wasted each year because of this. MP Benn has proposed phasing out all date codes on food
packaging with the exception of the expiration date, which he argues is the only meaningful code to most consumers.
The
British Retail Consortium (BRC) disagrees with this proposal, countering that better education of the consumer would be the
preferred course of action. Presumably this would be done by way of an intensive marketing campaign including
printed brochures, radio and television advertisements, and other promotional materials provided at the government’s
expense. The BRC says that the various date codes are clearly defined to express their usage towards quality,
stock rotation, and consumer safety applications.
I happen to agree with the Secretary
of State on this one. It has been my experience that whenever someone encounters a date code on any food
product, they assume it is one of expiration. I have explained the differences in my food safety training
classes, but always follow up with the old “Customer is always right” routine. I think about
my own prejudices towards milk date coding. After gulping down some soured chocolate milk, the carton still showing a couple
of days of sale left, I’ve become a stickler about date checking. I, and many others, follow the old adage; “If
in doubt, throw it out.”
9:27 am
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Eating Out in NYC without Salt
New York City has once again
fired the first shot in yet another battle to provide dietary guidelines for their citizens. In 2006, the
NYC Department of Health banned trans-fats in food service establishments. This was followed up in 2008 by requiring that
chains of 15 or more restaurants post calorie counts on their menu. Both these measures were met with stiff opposition from
the restaurant industry, yet both passed the legislature and court challenges to become law.
Now the NYC health officials
have set their sights on sodium chloride. Their newest initiative plans to reduce the average New Yorker’s daily salt
intake by 25% over the next five years and by 50% in the next ten years. Reasoning that people get the
majority of their sodium from prepared meals, officials are again targeting the restaurants and commercial food processors
to reduce the salt they put in their food. The underlying goal is to reduce health care costs associated with high blood pressure
and heart disease.
The NYC program is similar to one started in the United Kingdom in 2003. A
random sample of UK adults (19-64) taken in June 2008 indicate a 9% reduction in daily salt intake, from 9.5 g to 8.6 g since
2000. The FSA has targeted a further reduction to 6.0 g by 2010.
It is important to note that a high sodium diet is just
one of the risk factors believed to contribute to heart disease or high blood pressure. Diets high in fat, obesity, smoking,
lack of physical exercise, and heredity are also said to play a role in the development of coronary disease.
2:02 pm
Thursday, April 16, 2009
FDA and Food Allergens
Should the FDA update their list of common
food allergens? The accepted allergen list for the United States contains the 8 most common allergy inducing foods;
Milk, Eggs, Wheat, Fish, Shellfish, Peanuts, Tree nuts, and Soy. These are often referred to as the “Big 8” because
it is believed they account for approximately 90% of food allergies in this country. But there is ample evidence to
suggest that adverse reactions to sesame / sesame seeds are on the rise.
Ethnic foods are gaining popularity in the U.S., particularly snack foods
marketed toward children. Many of these contain sesame or its byproducts. Some researchers believe it is simply a numbers
game, the more people who eat a particular food, the greater probability of an allergic reaction. This may account for
localized allergen patterns in different countries. Sesame is the 3rd leading cause of food allergies in
the Middle East, after cow’s milk and eggs, whereas it is probably 9th among U.S. foods. The European Union
adds sesame, celery, mustard, and sulfites, to the American list.
I personally don’t think the U.S. is ready to declare mustard and celery
as major allergens, but the addition of sesame and sulfites to our accepted list may make sense at this time or in the near
future.
1:43 pm
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