Restaurants must remain vigilant in the ongoing hygiene battle, as Julie-anne Sprague discovers.
Restaurants must remain vigilant in the ongoing hygiene battle, as Julie-anne Sprague discovers.
THE recent outbreak of food poisoning at one of Perth’s best restaurants serves as a reminder that not even the most reputable are immune to the public relations nightmare of unwell customers.
Health Department principal food scientist Wayne Jolley says you can’t always see or smell whether your food will be carrying organisms responsible for food poisoning.
The onus, therefore, is on restaurants to make sure their food is safe for consumption.
But how can a restaurant tell if its supplier has sold it produce that may contain harmful bacteria?
According to Mr Jolley, common sense should prevail and, if a restaurant suspects the produce could be soiled, it should do itself a favour and not use it.
“If restaurants suspect there is something wrong with their produce they take the risk if they serve it to customers. If they suspect something is wrong they shouldn’t use it,” he said.
It’s a view shared by Restaurant and Catering Institute Association of WA president Harry Ferrante.
“The majority of restaurant owners are very experienced with food. Common sense will tell you if the food is bad and it is up to you to refuse it. I expect my suppliers to adhere to the same ethical guidelines that I do and that should carry through the entire chain,” Mr Ferrante says.
During the recent Christmas period, 54 people suffered food poisoning from Mead’s Restaurant, with one person hospitalised. However, the Health Department’s tests cannot provide a definitive source of where the food poisoning occurred.
Hampering their efforts, says Mr Jolley, is the lack of stool samples the department was able to obtain for testing. He says that, if people think they are suffering food poisoning, they should get a sample immediately.
“If you are really unwell and you suspect it may be food poisoning then ask for a stool sample because then we have something to work on,” he said.
“We received five samples to work with.”
And how do you know if it’s food poisoning or not? Tell-tale signs are nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea, but Mr Jolley says it’s a mistake to blame these symptoms on your last meal because the organisms responsible for food poisoning need time to produce the toxins that make you ill.
“The organism doesn’t matter, it is the toxin it produces. Things like Salmonella have to produce enough numbers to create an irritation, and that takes between 12 and 24 and up to 36 hours,” he says.
“People tend to blame their last meal but what we need to get is a history of what they’ve eaten over a period of days to determine the likely cause.”
The festive time is when the department receives the most complaints Mr Jolley says.
“Over this time of year there is more commonality to cases. People are eating out more and in large groups and eating from fixed menus. They all know one another so if they all get sick they can assume something was wrong with the meal,” he says
If you think that something is wrong with your food you can get it tested by various microbiology labs around town. Pathcentre does testing for the Health Department and other labs, such as Microserve and Promicro, can test for food poisoning. At between $15 and $20 per organism tested, it may be cheaper than the damaged reputation, although the practicality of the tests is hindered because it takes around three days to get results.
Mr Ferrante says this is not a practical time frame for those wanting to sell fresh produce.
“We can’t go and test food and then wait three days. The catch of the day then becomes the catch of the week,” he says.
Another testing facility available to users of food is DNA fingerprinting. While it doesn’t tell you whether food is soiled or not, it does tell you what your food is.
The Department of Minerals and Energy’s biochemist, Kevin Ho, says all they need is a fresh or frozen sample the size of a jelly bean and they can determine what the food is (ie is your fish barramundi or dhufish) and if it contains genetically modified organisms.
Points to remember about food poisoning: food poisoning takes time to develop, usually between 12 and 24 hours; if you suspect food poisoning, see your doctor immediately for a stool test; the most common food poisoning is XVJF; and the tell tale signs are nausea, vomiting, and diarrhoea.
A spokesperson for Mead’s was unavailable for comment.
THE recent outbreak of food poisoning at one of Perth’s best restaurants serves as a reminder that not even the most reputable are immune to the public relations nightmare of unwell customers.
Health Department principal food scientist Wayne Jolley says you can’t always see or smell whether your food will be carrying organisms responsible for food poisoning.
The onus, therefore, is on restaurants to make sure their food is safe for consumption.
But how can a restaurant tell if its supplier has sold it produce that may contain harmful bacteria?
According to Mr Jolley, common sense should prevail and, if a restaurant suspects the produce could be soiled, it should do itself a favour and not use it.
“If restaurants suspect there is something wrong with their produce they take the risk if they serve it to customers. If they suspect something is wrong they shouldn’t use it,” he said.
It’s a view shared by Restaurant and Catering Institute Association of WA president Harry Ferrante.
“The majority of restaurant owners are very experienced with food. Common sense will tell you if the food is bad and it is up to you to refuse it. I expect my suppliers to adhere to the same ethical guidelines that I do and that should carry through the entire chain,” Mr Ferrante says.
During the recent Christmas period, 54 people suffered food poisoning from Mead’s Restaurant, with one person hospitalised. However, the Health Department’s tests cannot provide a definitive source of where the food poisoning occurred.
Hampering their efforts, says Mr Jolley, is the lack of stool samples the department was able to obtain for testing. He says that, if people think they are suffering food poisoning, they should get a sample immediately.
“If you are really unwell and you suspect it may be food poisoning then ask for a stool sample because then we have something to work on,” he said.
“We received five samples to work with.”
And how do you know if it’s food poisoning or not? Tell-tale signs are nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea, but Mr Jolley says it’s a mistake to blame these symptoms on your last meal because the organisms responsible for food poisoning need time to produce the toxins that make you ill.
“The organism doesn’t matter, it is the toxin it produces. Things like Salmonella have to produce enough numbers to create an irritation, and that takes between 12 and 24 and up to 36 hours,” he says.
“People tend to blame their last meal but what we need to get is a history of what they’ve eaten over a period of days to determine the likely cause.”
The festive time is when the department receives the most complaints Mr Jolley says.
“Over this time of year there is more commonality to cases. People are eating out more and in large groups and eating from fixed menus. They all know one another so if they all get sick they can assume something was wrong with the meal,” he says
If you think that something is wrong with your food you can get it tested by various microbiology labs around town. Pathcentre does testing for the Health Department and other labs, such as Microserve and Promicro, can test for food poisoning. At between $15 and $20 per organism tested, it may be cheaper than the damaged reputation, although the practicality of the tests is hindered because it takes around three days to get results.
Mr Ferrante says this is not a practical time frame for those wanting to sell fresh produce.
“We can’t go and test food and then wait three days. The catch of the day then becomes the catch of the week,” he says.
Another testing facility available to users of food is DNA fingerprinting. While it doesn’t tell you whether food is soiled or not, it does tell you what your food is.
The Department of Minerals and Energy’s biochemist, Kevin Ho, says all they need is a fresh or frozen sample the size of a jelly bean and they can determine what the food is (ie is your fish barramundi or dhufish) and if it contains genetically modified organisms.
Points to remember about food poisoning: food poisoning takes time to develop, usually between 12 and 24 hours; if you suspect food poisoning, see your doctor immediately for a stool test; the most common food poisoning is XVJF; and the tell tale signs are nausea, vomiting, and diarrhoea.
A spokesperson for Mead’s was unavailable for comment.
