NIMR champions efforts to ensure production of safe, healthy foods

TO stop the over 600 million persons who fall ill and more than 400,000 others that die yearly from eating contaminated foods, according to the World Health Organisation ( WHO), the Nigerian Institute of Medical Research ( NIMR) has officially flaged off its health advocacy/ research and screening of food handlers and consumers from selected Local Government Areas ( LGAS) in Lagos State.

The event took place on May 5, 2022, at the NIMR auditorium, Yaba Lagos.

Director General ( DG) of NIMR, Prof. Babatunde Lawal Salako, said it is important for food handlers to maintain personal hygiene and imbibe the practice to ensure they produce healthy foods for public consumption.

Salako said, “We know that especially in Lagos, a lot of people leave home very early and get back home very late, that means that they will take one or two meals outside the home. Most of us will engage different kind of food sellers ranging from roadsides to those who are hawking and those that are well established in the bukkas, all categories and manner of food sellers in a state that is choked and highly populated.

“Nobody is tasting those foods to know if it is certified and safe to eat, even the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control ( NAFDAC) cannot give its number to all hawkers on the street, so we have danger that is coming from roadside foods.

“Prevention they say is better than cure, so what we must do regularly is to ensure adequate screening for people who cook for the public to eat, train them and let them know how they can reduce disease burden through the processes that they carry out.”

Salako said the training of food handlers is free of charge, as the Speaker, Federal House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, through his constituency project, has sponsored the project.

He said, “The training will start from Gbajabiamila’s constituency, which is Surulere Local Government Area ( LGA) and it will spread to other selected LGAS in Lagos State.

“The idea of this programme is to look at the processes in which public food handlers cook and how clean they carry out their activities, we will also examine the food handlers themselves to determine if they are actual carriers of these diseases or not.

“From whatever we see, we can then train the people to improve on their processes so people who patronise them are ensure disease/ germ- free foods.

“Many food handlers may not have been trained properly in the aspect of food safety for consumption, we have to train them to improve food safety and also food security in Nigeria”.

Furthermore, he promised that the stakeholders of these initiative will ensure that they come up with these screenings and trainings from time to time because as people goes out of the business, new ones come in, therefore it has to become a regular screening programme.