Tag: pertaining

  • INFOSAN Quarterly Summary, 2020 #1

    Food safety incidents

    During the first quarter of 2020, the INFOSAN Secretariat was involved in 38 food safety incidents involving 109 WHO Member States and 9 territories of WHO Member States. There were 25 incidents involving a biological hazard (Salmonella spp. [8], Listeria monocytogenes [5], Norovirus [3] Shiga-toxin producing Escherichia coli [2], Clostridium botulinum [2] Bacillus cereus [2], Cronobacter spp. [1], Shigella sonnei [1], unspecified biological hazard [1]), 6 involving an undeclared allergen (milk [3], peanut (1), egg [1], gluten [1]), 5 involving a physical hazard (undetermined foreign matter [2], glass [1], metal [1], plastic [1]), one involving a chemical/toxin hazard (histamine), and one linked to an unspecified hazard.

    The food categories that were most commonly involved in the 38 incidents during the first quarter of 2020 involved fish and other seafood (8), herbs and spices (4), legumes and pulses (4), milk and dairy products (3), nuts and oilseeds (3), snacks, desserts and other foods (3), cereals and cereal-based products (2), composite food (2), fruit and fruit products (2), meat and meat products (2), vegetables and vegetable products (2), products of special nutritional use (1), and food for infants and small children (1). One incident involved an unknown food source.

    During such international food safety incidents, the INFOSAN Secretariat relies on the swift action of national INFOSAN Emergency Contact Points to respond to requests for information. Rapid sharing of information through INFOSAN enables members to implement appropriate risk management measures to prevent illness in their respective countries.

    Geographic scope

    The outlined incidents involved Member States from all WHO regions: Europe (39), followed by the Americas (24), Africa (24), the Western Pacific (18), the Eastern Mediterranean (8) and South-East Asia (6).

    Recall in several countries of frozen spring roll sheets from Singapore due to the presence of an undeclared allergen

    In February 2020, the INFOSAN Secretariat was notified by the European Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF) and INFOSAN colleagues in Australia of a recall in Australia and several European countries of frozen spring roll sheets due to the detection of an undeclared allergen (milk), imported from Singapore. In collaboration with RASFF, the INFOSAN Secretariat was informed that the implicated frozen spring roll sheets were distributed internationally to 46 Member States from four WHO regions and 4 territories in Europe and the Western Pacific. Moreover, through engagement with the INFOSAN Emergency Contact Point (ECP) in Singapore, the INFOSAN Secretariat also received details of further distribution of implicated products to additional WHO Member States from all WHO regions, taking the total number of Member States involved to 65. It was also reported that the products involved had been redistributed by some countries to Europe, the Americas and Africa. Consequently, several countries recalled the implicated products to relabel them and investigated the issue to identify illnesses related to the consumption of the implicated frozen spring roll sheets. No illnesses were reported to the INFOSAN Secretariat.

    This incident has highlighted undeclared allergens as an important category of hazards that can result in a largescale international response to implement risk management measures and prevent illness. In addition, it exemplified efficient communication among INFOSAN members and the Secretariat.

    Outbreak of Listeriosis in the United States of America linked to enoki mushrooms imported from the Republic of Korea

    In March 2020, the INFOSAN Secretariat was made aware by the United States (US) Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) of an outbreak of Listeriosis in the US linked to the consumption of enoki mushrooms, imported from the Republic of Korea. In total, 36 cases including 4 deaths have been reported in the US. Following investigations in Canada, carried out in collaboration with the US, the INFOSAN Secretariat was informed of 6 cases of Listeriosis between 2017 and 2019 in Canada potentially related by whole genome sequencing (WGS) to the ongoing outbreak in the USA. In addition, food isolates (from enoki mushrooms from the Republic of Korea) genetically associated with the cluster of cases have been collected in 2019 by authorities in Canada. The WGS information pertaining to the cases and food isolates were shared on the INFOSAN Community Website to assist the identification of cases in other countries.

    The INFOSAN Secretariat engaged the INFOSAN Emergency Contact Point (ECP) in the Republic of Korea to seek details on any further international distribution of the implicated enoki mushrooms. Investigations are ongoing. 

    News & activities

    Food Sector and the COVID-19 outbreak

    On 31 December 2019, WHO was alerted to several cases of pneumonia of unknown origin in the city of Wuhan, Hubei Province, China. The virus, a previously unknown coronavirus has been named SARS-CoV-2 and is the cause of the COVID-19 disease.

    The WHO Epidemic Information Network (EPI-WIN) aims to share information tailored to specific sectors, including food and agriculture. The INFOSAN Secretariat has recently developed a guidance document for food businesses with regards to COVID-19 and food safety which is now available online. The guidance has also been disseminated through EPI-WIN and presented during two webinars.

    Call for applicants: INFOSAN Train-the-Trainer Workshop

    In February, the INFOSAN Secretariat issued a call for applications for the INFOSAN Train-the-Trainer workshop. With the constant growth of the network, and the increased need for training that this entails, the INFOSAN Secretariat, in collaboration with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), has announced this workshop which aims to increase the human resources available to train INFOSAN members on a range of INFOSAN-related topics, online or in-person. As a result, it is expected that the understanding of the roles and responsibilities of INFOSAN members will be improved, resulting in greater participation that will enhance speed and efficiency during the response to food safety emergencies at the global level. The INFOSAN Secretariat, together with CFIA, look forward to hosting this important workshop later this year.

    Developing the new INFOSAN Community Website

    The INFOSAN Community Website (ICW) continues to be an effective tool for the network to disseminate information during food safety emergencies. Over the past year, through the INFOSAN member survey, the Secretariat has gained a better understanding of how members use the ICW and how it can be improved to enhance information sharing. The information collected, together with the experience of members of the Secretariat, has provided numerous innovative ideas to guide the development of the new ICW. The Secretariat is pleased to announce that the competitive process to select the vendor that will develop the new INFOSAN Community Website has concluded and the work on the creation of the new ICW has begun. 

    Voice of an active network member

    voice-5-2020

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    https://www.who.int/news-room/detail/23-04-2020-infosan-quarterly-summary-2020-1

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  • Palm oil players in Sabah can resume operation, to adhere to state guidelines

    Palm oil players in Sabah can resume operation, to adhere to state guidelines

    Palm oil players in Sabah can resume operation, to adhere to state guidelines 1

    KUALA LUMPUR: The Malaysian Palm Oil Association (MPOA) and the Malaysian Estate Owners Association (MEOA) have been diligently engaging with the relevant authorities in Sabah and putting relevant measures to curb the spread of Covid-19 in the palm oil supply chain.

    In a joint statement yesterday, both associations said they were also grateful to the chief minister and state government for granting the palm oil supply chain the approval to resume operations in the affected six districts.

    “We are very grateful the authorities were able to appreciate the overall situation in assessing the risks pertaining to the Covid-19 and the oil palm plantation sector and approve the lifting of the shutdown,“ the statement said.

    It said both association were also appreciative of the open networking and effective engagement with the local plantation association, namely the East Malaysian Planters Association (EMPA), that led to the lifting of the shutdown.

    It added that the associations and its members would adhere strictly to the conditions set and would continue to engage and support the diligent measures taken by the state and relevant authorities to curb the spread of Covid-19 in Sabah.

    Meanwhile, Sime Darby Plantation Bhd (SDP) in a separate statement thanked the Sabah state government on its latest decision to allow oil palm estates and mills in Tawau, Lahad Datu, Kinabatangan, Semporna, Kunak and Kalabakan to resume operations.

    “We welcome this carefully measured decision which balances the need to control the spread of the Covid-19 virus whilst allowing an industry deemed essential by the National Security Council (NSC) to continue being productive,“ it said.

    SDP said it was committed to continue working with the authorities to ensure strict compliance to the operating conditions and guidelines of the state health department.

    “This has been our commitment for all our operations throughout the country since the commencement of the Movement Control Order (MCO) and we will continue to fulfill this commitment to mitigate any risks to the safety and health of our workers,“ it said.

    Sabah Chief Minister Datuk Seri Mohd Shafie Apdal yesterday allowed oil palm supply chain in Tawau, Lahad Datu, Kinabatangan, Semporna, Kunak and Kalabakan to resume operations if they had no positive virus cases, no persons under investigation for COVID-19 and no workers had had close contact with positive or suspected cases.

    However, all the re-opened oil palm operations must abide with the strict adherence to the guidelines prepared by the state health ministry. — Bernama

    Palm oil players in Sabah can resume operation, to adhere to state guidelines
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    https://www.thesundaily.my/local/palm-oil-players-in-sabah-can-resume-operation-to-adhere-to-state-guidelines-NB2245719

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  • Glossary of Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene, by G. Stanley Hall

    Glossary of Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene, by G. Stanley Hall

    GLOSSARY

    AGAMIC. Unmarried; unmarriageable, sometimes non-sexed.

    AGENIC. Lacking in reproductive power; sterile.

    AMPHIMIXIS. That form of reproduction which involves the mingling of substance from two individuals so as to effect a mixture of hereditary characteristics. It includes the phenomena of conjugation and fertilization among both unicellular and multicellular organisms.

    ANABOLISM. See METABOLISM.

    ANAMNESIC. Pertaining to or aiding recollection.

    ANEMIC. Deficient in blood; bloodless.

    ANTHROPOMORPHISM. The attributing of human characteristics to natural, supernatural, or divine beings.

    ANTHROPOMETRY. Science of measurement of the human body.

    ARTIFACT. Any artificial product.

    APHASIA. Impairment or lose of the ability to understand or use speech.

    ASSOCIATIONISM. The psychological theory which regards the laws of association as the fundamental laws of mental action and development.

    ATAVISTIC. Pertaining to reversion through the influence of heredity to remote ancestral characteristics.

    ATAXIC. Pertaining to inability to coördinate voluntary movements; irregular.

    CALAMO-PAPYRUS. Reed papyrus or pen-paper.

    CATABOLISM. See METABOLISM.

    CATHARSIS. Purgation or cleansing. Aristotle’s esthetic theory that little renders immune for much.

    CEREBRATION. Brain action, conscious or unconscious.

    CHOREA. St. Vitus’s dance; a nervous disease marked by irregular and involuntary movements of the limbs and face.

    CHRESTOMATHY. A collection of extracts and choice pieces.

    CHRISTENTHUM. The Christian belief; the spirit of Christianity.

    COMMANDO EXERCISES. Gymnastic exercises whose order is dependent upon the spoken command of the director.

    CORTEX. The gray matter of the brain, mostly on its surface.

    CORTICAL. Pertaining to the cortex.

    CRANIOMETRY. The measurement of skulls.

    CRYPTOGAMOUS. Having an obscure mode of fertilization; or, of plants that do not blossom.

    CULTUS. A system of religious belief and worship.

    DEUTSCHENTHUM. The spirit of the German people.

    DIATHESIS. A constitutional predisposition.

    EPHEBIC. Pertaining to the Greek system of instruction given to young men to fit them for citizenship; adolescent.

    EPIGONI. Successors; followers who only follow.

    EPISTEMOLOGY. The theory of knowledge; that branch of logic which undertakes to explain how knowledge is possible and to define its limitations, meaning, and worth.

    EUPEPTIC. Having good digestion.

    EUPHORIA. The sense of well-being; of fullness of life.

    EVIRATION. Emasculation; loss of manly characteristics.

    FERAL. Wild by nature; untamed; undomesticated.

    FORMICARY. An artificial ants’ nest.

    GEMÜTH. Disposition; the entire affective soul and its habitual state.

    HEBETUDE. Dullness; stupidity.

    HEDONISTIC. Relating to hedonism, that form of Greek philosophy which taught that pleasure is the chief end of existence.

    HETAERA. A Greek courtesan. This class was often highly trained in music and social art, and represented the highest grade of culture among Greek women.

    HETEROGENY. (1) The spontaneous generation of animals and vegetables, low in the scale of organization, from inorganic elements. (2) That kind of generation in which the parent, whether plant or animal, produces offspring differing in structure or habit from itself, but in which after one or more generations the original form reappears.

    HETERONOMOUS. Having a different name.

    HOROLOGY. The science of measuring time and of constructing instruments for that purpose.

    HYGEIA. The Greek goddess of health; health.

    HYPERMETHODIC. Methodic to excess; overmethodic.

    HYPERTROPHY. Excessive growth.

    INDISCERPTIBLE. Incapable of being destroyed by separation of parts.

    INHIBITION. Interference with the normal result of a nervous excitement by an opposing force.

    IRRADIATION. The diffusion of nervous stimuli out of the path of normal discharge which, as a result of the excitation of a peripheral end organ may excite other central organs than those directly connected with it.

    KINESOLOGICAL. Pertaining to the science of tests and measurements of bodily strength.

    KINESOMETER. An instrument for measuring muscular strength.

    MEDULLATION. The investment of nerve fibers with a protective covering or medullary sheath, consisting of white, fat-like matter.

    MERISTIC. Pertaining to the levels or spinal and cerebral segments of the body.

    METABOLISM. The act or process by which, on the one hand, dead food is built up into living matter—anabolism, and by which, on the other, the living matter is broken down into simpler products within a cell or organism—catabolism.

    METAMORPHOSIS. Change of form or structure; transformation.

    METEMPSYCHOSIS. The doctrine of the transmigration of the soul from one body to another.

    MONOPHRASTIC. Pertaining to or consisting of a single phrase.

    MONOTECHNIC. Pertaining to a single art or craft.

    MORPHOLOGY. The science of form and structure of plants and animals without regard to function.

    MYOLOGY. The scientific knowledge of the muscular system.

    MYTHOPOEIC. Producing or having a tendency to produce myths.

    NOETIC. Of, pertaining to, or conceived by, mind.

    NUANCE. Slight shade; difference; distinction; degree.

    ORTHOGENIC. Pertaining to right beginning and development.

    ORTHOPEDIC. Relating to the art of curing deformities.

    OSSUARY. A depository of dry bones.

    PALEOPSYCHIC. Pertaining to the antiquity of the soul.

    PANTHEISTIC. Relating to that doctrine which holds that the entire phenomenal universe, including man and nature, is the ever-changing manifestation of God, who rises to self-consciousness and personality only in man.

    PATRISTICS. That department of study occupied with the doctrines and writings of the fathers of the Christian Church.

    PHOBIA. Excessive or morbid fear of anything.

    PHYLETICALLY. In accordance with the phylum or race; racially.

    PHYLETIC. Pertaining to a race or clan.

    PHYLOGENY. The history of the evolution of a species or group; tribal history; ancestral development as opposed to ontogeny or the development of the individual.

    PHYLUM. A term introduced by Haeckel to designate the great branches of the animal and vegetable kingdoms. Each phylum may include several classes.

    PICKELHAUBE. The spiked helmet of the German army.

    PLANKTON. Sea animals and plants collectively; distinguished from coast or bottom forms and floating in a great mass.

    POLYGAMIC (LOVE). Pertaining to the habit of having more than one mate of the opposite sex.

    POLYPHRASTIC. Having many phrases; pertaining to rambling, incoherent speech.

    POST-SIMIAN. Pertaining to an age later than that in which simian or monkey-like forms prevailed.

    PRENUBILE. Pertaining to the age before sexual maturity or marriageability is reached.

    PRIE DIEU. A praying desk.

    PROPEDEUTIC. Preliminary; introductory.

    PROPHYLACTIC. Any medicine or measure efficacious in preventing disease.

    PSEUDOPHOBIAC. Pertaining to a morbid condition in which the subject is continually in fear of having said something not strictly true.

    PSYCHOGENESIS. The origin and development of soul.

    PSYCHONOMIC. Pertaining to the laws of mind.

    PSYCHOSIS. Mental constitution or condition; any change in consciousness, especially if abnormal.

    PUBERTY. The age of sexual maturity.

    PUBESCENT. Relating to the dawning of puberty.

    PYGMOID. Of pygmy size and form.

    RABULIST. A chronic wrangler; one who argues about everything.

    SCHEMA. A synopsis; a summary. In the Kantian sense, a general type.

    SCHEMATISM. An outline of any systematic arrangement; an outline.

    SUPERFOETATION. A second conception some time after a prior one, by which two foetuses of different age exist together in the same female. Often used figuratively.

    TEMIBILITY. (From Italian temibile, to be feared.) The principle of adjustment of penalty to crime in just that degree necessary to prevent a repetition of the criminal act.

    TIC. A nervous affection of the muscles; a twitching.

    TRANSCENDENTAL. In the Kantian system having an a priori character, transcending experience, presupposed in and necessary to experience.

    TRAUMATA. Wounds.

    TRAUMATISM. A wound; any morbid condition produced by wounds or other external violence.

    VERBIGERATION. The continual utterance of certain words or phrases at short intervals, without reference to their meaning, as seen in insane Gedankenflucht or rapid flight of thought.

    Extract from Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene, by G. Stanley Hall

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