Muslim trusts raised food safety alert early

IT IS a great tragedy that so many lives were lost due to the deadly Listeriosis outbreak and that it took the Health Department so long to get to the root cause of the problem.

Alarm bells should have been ringing in May of 2011, if only there was better communication and understanding between the South African Muslim Halaal trusts and government health departments.

The Halaal trusts’ boards play a major role in the dietary and eating habits of Muslims.

An urgent important notice from these local Halaal board trusts was widely circulated among the Muslim community in May 2011 and this is what was stated in this urgent notice: “Rainbow Chickens’ processed products are no longer certified halaal. This is due to the introduction of non-approved imported ‘Brazilian’ meats and its ‘failure to provide information’.

“The affected products are polony, Viennas, nuggets, strips, schnitzels, crumbed and other value-added products.

“However, there is no change in the Halaal status of the fresh and frozen Rainbow chickens which are slaughtered and processed at a separate Halaal-certified site.”

If heed was taken then and further serious government investigations had taken place about the “non-approved” imported products from Brazil, this tragedy could have been averted and many lives could have been saved.

MO NOOR JOSEPH Crawford