ROADSIDE EATERIES: Dishing out disease

Bengaluru may have streets lined with upmarket restaurants, but it is also home to roadside eateries providing cheap and affordable food to a large section of its people. The tasty delicacies are, however, known to spread disease in the absence of any checks on their quality with the BBMP doing little to keep them in line, report Chandrashekar G. and Abilash Mariswamy.

If you are a foodie and a traveller, there is a lot on offer to satisfy your appetite on television with shows revolving around food and exotic locations becoming hugely popular in recent years. While this has only spurred the love for both gourmet and street food in India, unfortunately those enjoying the latter may be satisfying their palate at the cost of their health. People, who frequent the roadside stalls or trucks, often don’t stop to think about the quality of the food they are consuming or the hygiene involved in its preparation.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation ( FAO) of the United Nations, over 2.5 billion people, especially women and children eat street food every day around the world and the result is food- borne infections like gastroenteritis, enteric fever and typhoid.

But this doesn’t stop many from enjoying it, especially if they happen to be from the lower middle class as this is usually the only kind of food they can afford to eat out. Bengaluru is no different. With new petite food outlets coming up on various streets and food trucks and stalls offering mouthwatering delicacies at numerous fests, people naturally flock to them, unmindful of the diseases they may be exposing themselves to.

Most of the street food is kept in the open to entice customers with its sight and smell, but in the process it is contaminated by emissions from passing vehicles and flies. Worse, the vendors are not known to wash their hands frequently or even if they do, the water they use often isn’t clean. Sometimes all they use is a hand towel, which is used to clean just about everything around, including the utensils.

Says Dr. Deepanju D Changkakoti, consultant, internal medicine, at Fortis Hospital, “Roadside food sold by street vendors is definitely unhygienic because of the kind of water they use to prepare it. Most of the time they do not even wash their hands before preparing or serving the food.”

Dr. Sunil Havannavar, consultant, internal medicine, Columbia Asia Hospital, Sarjapur Road too warns that street food can be a major source of illnesses as a result of the poor hygienic practices of the vendors and the sanitary conditions of their vending points. “Acute gastroenteritis including cholera, colitis, typhoid, and hepatitis are common illnesses caused by street food consumption,” he observes.

“Many of these illnesses are preventable. Use of protective clothing and covering the head while cooking, washing hands, medical screening of vendors and their water source and quality monitoring could prevent food- borne diseases,” say doctors.

Roadside food is definitely unhygienic because of the kind of water used to prepare it. It may not be clean enough to be consumed. Most of the time the vendors do not even wash their hands before preparing or serving the food.”. — DR DEEPANJU D CHANGKAKOTI CONSULTANT- INTERNAL MEDICINE AT FORTIS HOSPITAL Street food can be a major source of illnesses resulting from poor hygiene practices of vendors and sanitary conditions of the vending points. Acute gastroenteritis, including cholera, colitis, typhoid, and hepatitis are common illnesses due to street food consumption." — DR. SUNIL HAVANNAVAR, CONSULTANT- INTERNAL MEDICINE AT COLUMBIA ASIA HOSPITAL SARJAPUR ROAD