State ‘fails SA’ over food safety
Woeful shortage of inspectors and weak laws singled out
● South Africans are at risk of deadly foodborne diseases due to inadequate legislation and the government’s failure to ensure the country has enough environmental health practitioners.
“The situation is drastic. We do not even meet the minimum requirements when it comes to enough environmental health practitioners to ensure our citizens are safe,” said Dr Selva Mudaly, president of the South African Institute of Environmental Health, an NGO.
These practitioners include the inspectors who check food facilities, ranging from production plants to restaurants, to ensure food is safe for human consumption.
One health practitioner in the Fezile Dabi municipal district in the northern Free State said the district, with a population of more than 500 000, had only nine health practitioners, whereas it should have 50.
Asked when last they had taken samples from a major chicken processing plant in Sasolburg, which lies within the municipality, this official replied: “We were there two weeks ago but only after we received notice there was a problem. Before that I cannot remember when [there was last an inspection].
“The area is massive and it’s not just food facilities we inspect. It’s everything from heavy industry to factories. It’s got to a point where we have to prioritise, especially facilities like abattoirs.”
The official said food chain outlets should be inspected every four months, but this schedule was seldom maintained.
“The checks are more likely once every six months. If there is a problem, we will do it more often, but only if we know there is a problem, and we don’t always know that there is one.”
Doreen Khoza, health services compliance manager of Fezile Dabi district, did not respond to e-mailed questions about inspections at the Sasolburg chicken factory.
André du Plessis, mayoral committee member for environmental development and waste management in Ekurhuleni, said the district’s 3.3 million residents should be served by more than 300 health practitioners, but there were only 121.
“The practitioners we have are supposed to do inspections on all food manufacturers every three months, but they struggle to do it once every six months, and then these are only done when there is a full staff complement,” Du Plessis said.
Food safety experts say legislation is so broad that it requires no more than that food be declared safe. They say there is no legislation compelling manufacturers to test for or report health incidents such as a listeria outbreak. Nothing in the law indicates at what level listeria bacteria become unsafe.
The Health Professions Council of South Africa says 3 573 environmental health practitioners are registered with it, along with 68 environmental health assistants.
Mudaly said that under South Africa’s norms and standards, as well as those of the World Health Organisation, there should be one health practitioner to every 10 000 people. But the actual figure was, on average, closer to one for every 35 000 citizens.
“In some of the worst municipalities there is one practitioner to 100 000 people,” Mudaly said.
“That’s why you get situations like the listeriosis outbreak. By leaving out the routine inspections you fail to detect a potential problem until there is already an outbreak.”
He said the biggest disservice to citizens by the national government was its decision in 2004 to devolve responsibility for environmental health to local government.
“When government did this they forgot one critical thing, and that was to provide the necessary resources so local governments and municipalities could actually take over the function,” Mudaly said.
“National government never did a feasibility study. They just dumped the responsibility on municipalities.
“Health practitioners are responsible for air pollution, waste management and chemical safety controls, on top of food safety. The lack of provision of resources has proven to be deadly, as we see now.”
Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi, in announcing the outbreak’s source last week, said he wanted laws changed so that practitioners were employed by the national Department of Health.
A source in the Institute of Environmental Health said South Africa had only one state food laboratory.
“There is only one and that’s in Pretoria. How, when food safety is paramount, can it be that the country becomes beholden to private laboratories? Why has government not invested more in these laboratories?”
Food safety expert Professor Lucia Anelich said there was no legislation forcing food companies to test processing plants or food for listeria. “There are no guidelines on what to do if strains of the bacteria are found or what constitutes safe levels.”
Why has government not invested more in these laboratories?