Understanding the Complexities of Food Safety Using a "One Health" Approach (original) (raw)

One Health and the food chain: maintaining safety in a globalised industry

The Veterinary record, 2014

is a global strategy for expanding interdisciplinary collaborations and communications in all aspects of healthcare for people, animals and the environment. Vets have a huge role to play in this, as they have the knowledge and the competencies to span many areas and to facilitate better interdisciplinary cooperation. Many professionals in the agri-food sector work within their confined areas without realising the real objective of their activities. Phenomenal advances have been and continue to be made in the genetics of food-producing animals and fish. Relentless selection for production traits has delivered us very different livestock from those our forefathers tended. Animal nutritionists are far ahead of their human counterparts when it comes to diet formulation and performance. In many species they control the totality of the diet, the rearing environment and have clear outcome measures, such as food conversion efficiency, weight gain, milk yield or egg production. Furthermore, breed types have dramatically reduced individual variability, and for broilers, pigs and fish species, the stock are very closely genetically related. Genetics creates the potential and nutrition delivers on it, but suboptimal animal health or welfare can undermine any gains these may offer. Good animal health status is essential for safe food, and stressed animals are more prone to disease, so the production of safe food should be a goal for all engaged in agri-food activities. Those

Improving Food Safety in the Domestic Environment: The Need for a Transdisciplinary Approach

Risk Analysis, 2005

Microbial food safety has been the focus of research across various disciplines within the risk analysis community. Natural scientists involved in food microbiology and related disciplines work on the identification of health hazards, and the detection of pathogenic microorganisms. To perform risk assessment, research activities are increasingly focused on the quantification of microbial contamination of food products at various stages in the food chain, and modeling the impact of this contamination on human health. Social scientists conduct research into how consumers perceive food risks, and how best to develop effective risk communication with consumers in order to improve public health through improved food handling practices. The two approaches converge at the end of the food chain, where the activities regarding food preparation and food consumption are considered. Both natural and social sciences may benefit from input and expertise from the perspective of the alternative discipline, although, to date, the integration of social and natural sciences has been somewhat limited. This article therefore explores the potential of a transdisciplinary approach to food risk analysis in terms of delivering additional improvements to public health. Developing knowledge arising from research in both the natural and social sciences, we present a novel framework involving the integration of the two approaches that might provide the most effective way to improve the consumer health associated with food-borne illness.

PERSPECTIVES ON INTEGRATED APPROACH TO FOOD SAFETY

Food is universal to man as well as animals which also provide a bulk of the food needed by man. The current population of the world stands at about 7 billion. With this increasing population is also the increasing need to provide not just food but also healthy food for the consumption of man. In this paper we examine the integrated approach to food safety in order to meet the need for healthy food by man and in a healthy manner to all the occupants of the planet whether plants or animals. This is even more important considering new trends in outbreaks of food-borne diseases around the world such as the recent outbreak caused by Escherichia coli 0104:H4 in Europe and the United States which is said to be the worst outbreak in history. Key words: Integrated, food, safety, E.coli, outbreak, population

Animal health and food safety

British Medical Bulletin, 2000

Foods of animal origin have an important role in a balanced diet and must be safe for human consumption. Equally important is the need for the food to be perceived as safe by the consumer. Safe food of animal origin must be free from animal pathogens that infect man and from contamination by residues. While intensive farming practices have been linked with the rise in foodborne illness in humans, it is interesting to note that the rise has continued even when there has been a shift to less intensive farm production systems. While the production of meat, milk and eggs, regardless of new technology or changes in production methods, cannot be expected to achieve zero bacterial risk, there is the need to reduce the risk and, where possible, eliminate it at the 'on the farm stage'. The current use of the terms 'farm-to-table', 'stable-to-table' and 'plough-to-plate' clearly identifies the farm as one part of the production chain which must be considered in terms of food safety.

Pandemics and food systems - towards a proactive food safety approach to disease prevention & management

Food Security, 2020

Recent large-scale pandemics such as the covid19, H1N1, Swine flu, Ebola and the Nipah virus, which impacted human health and livelihoods, have come about due to inadequate food systems safeguards to detect, trace and eliminate threats arising from zoonotic diseases. Such diseases are transmitted to humans through their interaction with animals in the food value chain including through the consumption of bush meat. Climate change has also facilitated the emergence of new zoonotic diseases. The lack of adequately enforced food-safety standards in managed agricultural production systems creates the necessary conditions for diseases to mutate into highly contagious strains. The lack of food safety measures in handling, packaging and sales of food increases risks of cross-species contamination. Finally, increasing anti-microbial resistance, combined with rapid urbanization and global interconnectedness allows diseases to spread rapidly among humans. Thus, part of the reconstruction effo...

The New Food Safety

FoodSciRN: Food Policy (Topic), 2019

A safe food supply is essential for a healthy society. Our food system is replete with different types of risk, yet food safety is understood as encompassing only foodborne illness and other risks related directly to food ingestion. This Article argues for a more comprehensive definition of food safety, one that includes not just acute, ingestion-related risks, but also whole-diet cumulative ingestion risks, and cradle-to-grave risks of food production and disposal. This broader definition, which we call “Food System Safety,” draws under the header of food safety a variety of historically siloed, and often under-regulated, food system issues including nutrition, environmental protection, and workplace safety. The current approach to food safety is inadequate. First, it contributes to irrational resource allocation among food system risks. Second, it has collateral consequences for nutrition, environmental protection, and workplace safety, and, third, its limited focus can undermine ...

Food safety and nutrition

The impact of the International Livestock Research Institute, 2020

This book chapter focuses on a programme on improving human health through livestock research in three areas: (i) animal-source foods for nutrition; (ii) zoonoses (diseases transmitted between animals and people); and (iii) FBD. This was the first CGIAR group with an explicit food safety mandate (rather than focusing on specific hazards) and with expertise in using research methods for food safety rather than diseases in general. ILRI was also one of the first groups to focus on food safety in the 'informal markets' of developing countries, and by the 2010s, had become the lead research institute globally in this emerging area. ILRI research on FBD has resulted in many science outputs, including some genuinely innovative tools and approaches, and has already demonstrated outcomes at community, national and regional levels. These include substantial inputs into global, regional and national strategies and national training programmes. The major development-oriented approach -...

Accepted Manuscript An Introduction to Current Food Safety Needs

Food safety is embedded in food-related problems, and in proposeed solutions. Despite 2 continuous investment, the WHO estimates 23 million cases of foodborne illness and 5,000 deaths 3 in Europe every year and Europeans are not confident in the food system. Now, the circular 4 economy aims to improve global food security through sustainable production, thus new 5 ingredients, methods and food safety challenges. Food is unequivocally linked to non-6 communicable diseases, and changes are needed for nutritional food safety. Emerging and re-7 emerging foodborne pathogens are changing the epidemiology of foodborne diseases. 8 Additionally, some chemicals are of concern, and food is a major source of human exposure. 9 Finally, risk communication is required for management of consumer-based foodborne hazards, 10 yet this foodborne illness is common. We ignore food safety challenges at our peril as potential 11 consequences of a lapse are huge; keeping the food supply safe is a never-ending task.