Roadside sellers, school vendors as well as conventional restaurants offering ready-to-eat food to the public “without the benefit of warmers and chillers that allow for those foods to be served at the correct temperature” are likely to come under greater public health-related pressure to raise their game, Director of the Government Analyst Food and Drugs Department (GA/FDD) Marlan Cole has told the Stabroek Business.
“The imperative of people having to make a living cannot be used as an excuse for ignoring the serious dangers that derive from services that offer ready-to-eat foods without the benefit of warmers and chillers. Frankly, we have ignored that reality for too long and it would be foolhardy to continue to pretend that the public health danger does not exist,” Cole said.
“Once we begin a discourse about serving foods at the correct temperature there is bound to be an argument about the problem that this creates for the micro-businesses like the lunch ladies who provide services to schoolchildren. I believe that we have overlooked these food safety issues for far too long and that the time has come for us to draw a line in the sand on these issues. People who want to provide these kinds of services must be prepared to live within the public health regulations. We cannot continue to make exceptions on any grounds whatsoever.”
On Monday, the GA/FDD issued a statement chiding “caterers and vendors” who are neglectful of the importance of ensuring that ready-to-eat foods “are served to consumers at the correct temperature by using warmers and chillers.” The statement charged that some vendors when delivering and/or selling such foods “consistently allow food to be kept in the danger zone (room temperature or temperature between 100C – 60 0C) for in excess of two hours.” In this regard Cole zeroed in on roadside vendors whom he said, “invariably lack the infrastructure to ensure the safety of the ready-to-eat foods that they provide. In this instance the food safety consideration must supersede such feelings that we might have for the small operator. There can be no small compromises here. The public health considerations must come first.”
The GA/FDD Head said that his department was also concerned over the likely implications of local food safety standards for the country’s stated ambition to build a viable tourist industry. “It has become commonplace for tourists to get acquainted with the local cuisine by sometimes sampling what vendors and small snackettes offer. We run the danger of killing off tourism before it even gets going if we do not tackle these issues now,” Cole said.
Meanwhile, Cole said, the full and effective implementation of measures to ensure that vendors of ready-to-eat foods comply with safety regulations may well be affected by capacity deficiencies at the GA/FDD as well as “some measure of resistance” from some vendors. “With so much at stake we cannot those considerations to deter us,” Cole added.
“The department will continue to build capacity in our food microbiological laboratory to test and analyze samples of foods submitted by environmental health officers from the regions and public health inspectors in the city and municipalities in support of their surveillance and regulatory oversight of the food service industry.”
Stabroek Business spoke with three ready-to-eat food vendors in various parts of the city none of whom possess the inventory necessary to serve what they offer at the correct temperature. One of them, Candace (not her real name), told this newspaper that she was aware of the health risks involved in serving “cold food” outside the school where she sells but that she could not afford to acquire a warmer. Interestingly, this newspaper observed that at around 14:00 hrs on Tuesday, Candace’s display case still contained a few egg balls which had been placed there since much earlier in the day. The other two vendors with which this newspaper spoke were offering similar ready-to-eat foods outside public places in the city without employing heating or cooling equipment. Both of them said that the costs meant that acquiring such equipment was out of the question.
The GA/FDD release said that the practice of serving ready-to-eat foods outside the recommended temperature range “allows for the rapid growth and multiplication of pathogenic (bad) bacteria that may result in food poisoning or food intoxication…, when used by consumers. Unsuspecting consumers are then presented with food-borne disease symptoms such as diarrhea, acute gastroenteritis, vomiting and stomach cramps in some cases.”
Asserting that “we have to make choices that protect our population and particularly our unsuspecting school children” Cole said the message which his department was seeking to send was not the responsibility of the GA/FDD alone. “I honestly believe that part of the responsibility in this matter lies with the business community itself… like the Georgetown Chamber and the Private Sector Commission. After all, business is not only about profit it is about providing a certain quality of service. And the business community as a whole has a duty to do what it can to ensure that food vendors, whether restaurants or roadside services, offer safe and wholesome food,” Cole said.
