Avoiding Cross Contamination

When handling or preserving food, it is necessary to avoid traditional methods, which encourage cross contamination at home. Traditional methods of food preservation are sometimes dangerous since some of them do not consider hygiene of the storage facilities, thus could lead to food contamination. For example, the preservation of fresh fish could be done with no regard to contamination from possible oil spill in the water. Even though, there could be suspicion that the food preservative such as dispersant was not safe, the people continued to use it, thus suffered dire consequences. Therefore, the aftermath of such actions was an increase in health risks and ultimately the death of the food consumers.

When refrigerating pieces of food at home, one should put seafood, poultry and raw meat in sealed containers or bags to stop their juices from leaking onto other food supply. Moreover, the reason for this is that raw juices contain bacteria, which are harmful to human health. Bacteria living organisms with cell walls, on the other hand, viruses are proteins with capsid coats made up of either ribonucleic acids (RNA) or deoxyribonucleic acids (DNA). Therefore, it is important to note that bacteria are living while viruses are non-living. Antibiotics attack bacteria from different points. Essentially, antibiotics attach onto ribosome and permanently bind; furthermore, this stops the manufacture of proteins. Some antibiotics attach onto cell wall thereby preventing synthesis of cell wall. Since viruses are non-living, they lack functioning systems. They survive by hijacking cell in the body to survive. The protein coat provides a shell and helps viruses to attach onto cells of living organisms. Therefore, an antibiotic that kills viruses would also kill the viruses’ hosts. Additionally, it is hard to make antibiotics and antiseptics that kill viruses because of the high rate at which viruses mutate and cells of living organisms require medicines that are toxic.

In addition, the food must be kept clean during its preparation. It implies that one’s hands and surfaces must be washed several times, since harmful bacteria are capable of spreading throughout the whole kitchen to get onto counter tops, utensils and cutting board. In order to prevent such health-risk scenario, one should do the following:

Wash hands with soap and hot water before and after handling food, and after using the  bathroom, changing diapers; or handling pets. Use hot, soapy water and paper towels or clean cloths to wipe up kitchen surfaces or spills. Wash cloths often in the hot cycle of your washing machine. Wash cutting boards, dishes, and counter tops with hot, soapy             water after preparing each food item and before you go on to the next item (Prevent  Cross-Contamination, 2007).

In addition, prepared food must be served in clean utensils. However, cooked food should not be put in the same cutting board or utensil used previously to hold raw food.

Avoiding Food Contamination in Business

Even though health practitioners hold diverse opinion on ways to avoid food cross contamination in business, more focus should be given on food supply. The topic that sparks interest in food chain is the supply, production, eating habit or diet, and the safety of the food that we eat. Essentially, issues of production, processing, and supply of human food causes a lot of worries to consumers in terms of its safety (Chevat, 2009). Pollan states that industrial food chain begins with food wholesaled in stores which, as he says, entails mainly of corn products.  From the 1970s, corn became staple crop in America, because President Nixon’s regime introduced policies, corporate preferences and technological developments (Pollan, 2006). The supply of this kind of foodstuff was enhanced by an increase in the production of corns that dominated the agricultural production in the country. As a result of population growth, these progresses were aimed at growing the quantity of foodstuff and lowering the cost of products to enable the country feed its population. In fact, growing and processing corn was cheap and fast, thus could not affect the country’s supply chain. Chevat asserted that over reliance on corn and its products may mean that the Americans are failing to get correct quantities of other food supplements resulting into malnutrition (Chevat, 2009).

The capitalist model of food manufacture is intended turning human desires into produce for the sole perseverance of making incomes. Therefore, multinational corporations emphasize more on the income rather than engineering food that feed or sustain population of the world. The capitalist model has continued growth in the prices of basic necessity products due to social, economic, environmental, ideological and ethical crises. According to the book The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Pollan talks about the use of fertilizers in the farms, which resulted into soil pollution (Pollan, 2006). Nevertheless, the harvests from the corn fields improved, people who became more unprotected to the chemicals that were used, since there have been no instructions to control the usage of chemicals. Consequently, the capitalist model of food manufacture was not the best way to adopt since it protected generally the large international companies. Several people have grown their own food, and this experience has affected their dietary preference.

Essentially, this has transformed the eating experience, for the reason that someone is able to control the quantity of carbohydrates that he/she can eat at any particular meal. It is different from the foods bought in supermarkets where the manufacturer has the sole authority of the quantity of corn (carbohydrates) that is to be supplemented in the food products sold to consumers (Chevat, 2009). Uncontrolled consumption of food has brought several diseases such as obesity, diabetes and cancer. This means that consumer has to be conscious about his diet to avoid suffering from such lifestyle diseases, which continue to affect many people globally.

In most cases, food sold in supermarkets and other places with highly hygienic conditions are safe for human consumption. The reason for this assurance is that several multinational companies have quality control departments, which test the quality of food manufactured before selling to the wholesalers (Pollan, 2006). In addition, food tasters have to be taken to the government’s agency of standard that tests the quality of the mass-produced. Agricultural professionals also recommend the right amounts of fertilizers and pesticides that are supposed to be useful in agricultural farms. Scientific inventions in the field of biotechnology may water down the achievements made since genetically modified foods are finding their way into the markets (Chevat, 2009). In order to ensure that the food that we eat is safe and consumers are protected, the government should develop commercial and behaviors that focus on specific nutrients as a substitute of exclusive benefits that is resulting from eating entire food. People should consume quality foodstuff instead of eating products that have low nutritional value.

Moreover, someone should put seafood, poultry and raw meat separately from other grocery while shopping. It should be done at checkouts as well as one’s grocery bags. In summary, hygiene standards must be maintained at home to avoid contamination of food by harmful bacteria that cause infections. To this end, someone who is handling food must wash his/ her hands several times. Cutting boards and utensils must also be kept clean. Finally, one should avoid mixing raw meat, seafood and poultry with other foodstuffs in one shopping bag to avoid their juices, which can drip onto other food items.