| Popis: |
Despite an increase in the number of food handlers receiving food hygiene training, a high number of food poisoning outbreaks still occur as a result of improper food handling practices in the retail industry. In this study, samples were collected from the hands and aprons of food handlers in the delicatessen sections of a prominent South African retail group and analysed for the presence of total viable counts (TVC), total coliforms, Escherichia coli , members of the family Enterobacteriaceae and Staphylococcus aureus in order to assess the levels of contamination and to establish possible relationships. Noteworthy TVC were present on 98% of hands and 84% of aprons sampled and conformed to the national standard of 1 × 10 2 cfu cm −2 without exception. Coliforms were present on 40% of food handler’s hands and on 26% of aprons and when compared to the literature which suggests a target value of −2 , 32% of food handlers exceeded the target with regard to hands and 8% with regard to aprons. E. coli was found to only exceed the limit in the case of one food handler. Enterobacteriaceae were present on the hands of food handlers (44%) and on aprons (16%), ranging between 5 and 1.8 × 10 1 cfu cm −2 on hands and between 5 and 2.9 × 10 1 cfu cm −2 on aprons. S. aureus counts were present on 88% of hands and 48% of aprons and ranged between negligible and 9.8 × 10 1 cfu cm −2 for hands and up to 6.2 × 10 1 cfu cm −2 for aprons. No significant statistical correlation occurred between the organisms on hands and aprons, indicating that the latter were not likely to be cross-contaminated by hands. |
Full Text from ScienceDirect