By Perla Lena/PNA
ILOILO CITY — With everybody busy preparing for this holiday season, the Department of Health–Center for Health Development (DOH-CHD) in Western Visayas is reminding the public to always put premium on food safety.
Dr. Elvie Villalobos, CHD 6 Infectious, Environmental and Occupational Health cluster head, in a press conference Wednesday enumerated five ways to ensure safe food this Christmas season.
Keeping food safe starts with the preparation, so it is recommended that all those that will have contact with the food must be clean. “Wash your hands before handling food,” Villalobos said.
Raw food must be separated from cooked ones, as he explained that uncooked foods should be washed thoroughly or have them half-cooked.
Foods must be cooked thoroughly, especially meat. “Separate raw meat, poultry and seafood from other foods. Use separate equipment and utensils such as knife and chopping board,” she added.
Always keep foods at safe temperature. Cooked foods that are stored in room temperature have to be consumed within four hours or when refrigerated must be stored for not more than seven days.
Villalobos added that water that will be used when cooking have to be potable. “Water is potable when it is analyzed that it has no microorganism,” she said.
Villalobos said that from January to October this year, Western Visayas has recorded 449 individuals that were affected by food poisoning with one death from out of the 19 events.
The lone death was caused by eating a green paddy frog. It was recorded early this year in Barangay Abaca in San Enrique, Iloilo.
Villalobos added that same period last year, the DOH-CHD 6 recorded only 299 cases but with 15 deaths.
Of the 15, she said that 11 were due to cholera after the victims were not brought to the hospital while four cases were due to typhoid fever.
