Ensuring personal hygiene for food handlers

 

Poor personal hygiene can cause serious problems in the kitchen, food poisoning being the most serious, causing irreparable damage to a food business's reputation.

 

Filed under
Cleaning Services
 
October 28, 2022
 
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Ensuring personal hygiene for food handlers
 

 

As a food handler it is important for you to practice good personal hygiene to ensure a safe working environment and prevent the spread of foodborne illnesses. To discuss this topic in detail, we spoke to Ms. Mona Harbali, Food Safety Consultant and Trainer, Rentokil Boecker and Mr. Sutharson Sathiah, Senior Manager - HSE & Risk, Global Village.

Importance of personal hygiene important for food handlers
Personal hygiene is an essential component in food safety because most of the contaminations that happen in any food business are because of the actions of food handlers. That is why food safety consultants and trainers always emphasise on having proper personal hygiene habits in a food business. There are a lot of hazards associated with not ensuring personal hygiene. These include microbiological hazards that can happen through hands, hair strands, and the skin. Certain physical hazards can also happen from wearing jewellery, having buttons on the uniform, etc. We can also have chemical hazards that can happen from wearing perfumes and cleaning agents that are used by food handlers. Last but not least, the allergenic hazards can happen because of poor hand hygiene and lack of washing utensils as well. 

There are two important aspects to personal hygiene - human behaviour and perception of the customers. 

Speaking of human behaviour, when you program a machine with certain commands, there is little chance of error. However, things are not the same with human beings. The chance of human error is always there. You can coach 100 human beings, train them and give them the process, and still not be able to completely eliminate the chance of human error. 

Global Village hosts approximately 300+ F&B outlets and people from different parts of the world. These people hold different perspectives of personal hygiene depending on the cultures they come from. It is a challenging environment but personal hygiene is ensured by creating a culture. The moment people come inside, they blend into this culture. So creating a positive culture plays a pivotal role here. When you create a positive culture, people will adhere and adapt to it. 

The second part is perception. People have changed with time. They are expecting you to be clean and hygienic. They expect you to wear gloves and other parts of personal protective equipment because they are at a heightened level of hygiene awareness than before. When you prepare food in front of them (and this applies especially to street food), and don’t wear a hair net or gloves, it may not always lead to a case of food poisoning but it certainly ends up in a customer’s poor perception of your business and negative publicity. 

Food handlers – handwashing

As we have seen, thorough hand washing reduces the chance of contaminating food with bacteria.

Wash your hands with soap and warm water, and don’t forget the backs of your hands, wrists, between your fingers and under your fingernails.

Thoroughly dry your hands immediately after you wash them. 

When to wash your hands?

  • After going to the toilet
  • After handling raw food
  • After blowing your nose
  • After handling garbage
  • After touching your ears, nose, mouth or other parts of the body
  • After smoking
  • After every break
  • After handling animals.

 

The basic rules of personal hygiene for food handlers

The most important thing is hand washing. No amount of emphasis you put on hand washing in a food business is enough. In fact, the food business has always been very particular about hand washing but now every other business understands its importance. 

Washing hands doesn’t just mean washing them with soap and water. There is a certain technique that must be followed. Hands must be washed for a minimum duration of 20 seconds. Then they have to be dried with disposable tissues and then they need to sanitise their hands. The problem, however, is that, when food handlers are very busy, they tend to forget hand washing or they tend to wash them for a shorter duration than what is prescribed. 

Another important factor is changing gloves often. Other basic rules of hygiene include proper coverage of the hair with a hair net, wearing a clean uniform to work and ensuring that food handlers wear the right type of uniform (that will not have buttons on it, should be long sleeved, etc). 

The next important factor is reporting illness. Generally, it has been observed that the staff is scared of reporting illness because they think that if they report illness, they will have to take a sick leave and the management will not be happy about it. When they don’t report illness, food handlers may contaminate food, so employers and employees must be careful to ensure that no illness is passed on by those working in the industry.

So there must be a proper positive culture in place that allows people to report any medical conditions freely. Businesses must also ensure that food handlers should be aware of their sickness policy and in case they are not aware, it should be communicated to them. 

Tips for food handlers experiencing medical conditions

  • You should not go to work if you are vomiting or have diarrhoea. Don’t return to work until your symptoms have stopped for 48 hours. If you are unsure, you should contact your doctor for advice.
  • Do not go to work if you are sick with an illness that is likely to be transmitted through food. Such illnesses include gastroenteritis (often called ‘gastro’) – including viral gastroenteritis (norovirus or rotavirus) – hepatitis A and hepatitis E, sore throat with fever, and fever with jaundice.
  • You must advise your supervisor if you are feeling unwell, including when suffering from a cold, flu, etc and other eye infections.

Common mistakes in hygiene that food handlers make
1. Cough or sneeze into food or on hands

If food handlers must absolutely must cough or sneeze, they must ensure they:

  • Throw out any food that was 'in the line of fire'
  • Try to do so into a bent elbow, well away from food
  • Wash your hands afterwards 
  1. Smoke

Do not smoke when you're handling food. If food handlers smoke away from food premises, they must wash their hands thoroughly before resuming work duties.

  1. Wipe away sweat using hands or apron

Commercial kitchens can get unbearably hot and often food handlers think that wiping sweat away from their face is better than having it drip into the food. However using their hands or apron doesn't stop dangerous bacteria from getting into the food. Instead, use a cloth that won't be used for food handling.

  1. Putting their fingers in their mouth

Under no circumstances should a food handler be putting his/her fingers (or fingernails) in or near the mouth during their food handling shift. If they do it accidentally, they must wash your hands thoroughly straight away.

  1. Touching the face or jewellery

Food handlers must refrain from touching their face when they're working with food. Wearing jewellery is also highly discouraged in food businesses because jewellery can harbour dangerous bacteria and can also be a choking hazard if it falls into food. 

Personal hygiene tips for food handlers

  • Wash and dry your hands thoroughly before handling food, and wash and dry them again frequently during work.
  • Dry your hands with a clean towel, disposable paper towel or under an air dryer.
  • Never smoke, chew gum, spit or eat in a food handling or food storage area.
  • Never cough or sneeze over food, or where food is being prepared or stored.
  • Wear clean protective clothing, such as an apron.
  • Keep your spare clothes and other personal items (including mobile phones) away from where food is stored and prepared
  • Tie back or cover long hair.
  • Keep fingernails short so they are easy to clean, and don’t wear nail polish because it can chip into the food.
  • Avoid wearing jewelry, or only wear plain-banded rings and sleeper earrings
  • Completely cover all cuts and wounds with a wound strip or bandage (brightly coloured waterproof bandages are recommended)
  • Wear disposable gloves over the top of the wound strip if you have wounds on your hands.
  • Change disposable gloves regularly
  • Advise your supervisor if you feel unwell, and don’t handle food.

 

The low rate of compliance

So, why the low rate of compliance? Surveys have found these barriers to handwashing amongst restaurant workers:

  • Too busy to take the time
  • Hand sinks out of sight – or too few in number
  • Soap and paper towels not always available at sinks
  • Wearing gloves, which may create a false sense of security and lead to less frequent handwashing
  • Hand hygiene not considered a key workplace priority
  • Connection between hand hygiene and foodborne illness not clearly understood or appreciated
  • Irritated skin due to frequent washing

How to ensure compliance

While it seems most of these obstacles appear relatively ‘simple’ to overcome, what can F&B operators do to overcome these barriers and change employee handwashing behaviour for the better? Public health authorities suggest the following:

  • Guard against overly busy staff: Restaurant owners or managers need to ensure adequate staffing levels so the ‘no time’ excuse for not washing hands regularly is absent amongst employees.
  • Make handwashing convenient: Install hand sinks within employees’ sight – and keep supplies of soap and paper towels continuously stocked.
  • Use soaps that are gentle on hands: Many public health authorities do not recommend the routine substitution of hand sanitisers for soap and water use in food service settings.
  • Factor handwashing into food preparation flow: Structure activities to minimise the number of times handwashing is needed.
  • Lead by example: Make sure that all restaurant managers make handwashing a visible priority by setting the example for others.
  • Keep it top of mind: Use food safety events in the news to reinforce the connection between hand hygiene and foodborne illness – and to further underscore why effective handwashing is everyone’s responsibility.
  • Make it personal: When you see good behaviour, reinforce it through personal recognition and appreciation.
  • Offer motivation: Monitor hand hygiene compliance – and report the findings. Incentives and friendly competition among teams can inspire improved compliance.

Food handlers – skills and knowledge

Food handlers need to know how their actions can affect the safety of the food they handle.

Food handlers need to know:

  • How to locate and follow workplace information
  • About their own food handling operations
  • How to identify and correct (or report) situations or procedures that do not meet the business' food safety obligations
  • Who to report food safety issues to within the business
  • Their responsibilities in relation to health and hygiene requirements.

Finally, firm up the process. Restaurant owners and operators would never allow insurance policies protecting premises from the risks of fire, flood or personal injury to lapse, so employ the same approach and focus on hand hygiene training – do not let it falter. A well-trained, compliant staff is the best insurance against a foodborne outbreak and the devastation it can wreak on customers’ health, as well as a business’ reputation and bank account.