Food Safety
Why is it important to cook some foods to a certain internal temperature?
Cook to certain temperatures to kill bacteria, germs, etc. For example: Salmonella is destroyed at temperatures above 150 degrees Fahrenheit
This type of vector picks up infectious agents on the outside of their bodies and transmits the agents to susceptible hosts through physical contact. Essentially a living vehicle for the agents.
Mechanical vector
What types of key prevention and control strategies were implemented in Washoe County for particulate matter?
Burn code, woodstove exchange, smoke management, dust control, street brining and sweeping
Drowning is an example of what type of injury?
Unintentional injury.
(Intentional injuries aka Violence: homicide, suicide)
Are mental illnesses easy or difficult for epidemiologists to count/track?
Since mental illnesses are sometimes difficult to diagnose (due to overlap of symptoms) they are difficult for epidemiologists to count/track.
Which bacteria (cause of foodborne illness) comes from mostly eggs, meat, milk, and poultry?
Salmonella-non-typhoidal (Salmonellosis)
What type of vector-borne disease is Lyme Disease?
Zoonotic Vector-borne disease
What is the building up of a chemical in an organism’s tissues over its lifetime, as the organism continually takes in more than it excretes?
Bioaccumulation
(Biomagnification is the process by which a chemical becomes more concentrated in the tissues of organisms at each higher level of the food chain within an ecosystem.)
Obesity is an example of what type of occupational health issue/injury?
Sedentary lifestyle
This prevention strategy is when interventions are aimed at individuals showing early warning signs of
substance abuse or problems, and exhibit risk factors.
Indicated prevention
What is a role of the local government in food safety?
Inspections, HACCP, monitoring
Describe what a vector is.
Vector: any organism that carries and transmits an infectious agent (virus, bacteria, etc.) into another living organism.
What is a dose-response relationship?
Quantitative relationship between a toxin (dose) and a toxic effect (response)
Two key characteristics: Slope: the increase in toxic response for a given increase in dose (potency of effect). Threshold: the highest dose at which no toxic effect occurs (potential for safe dose)
• Note: this is important because the dose makes it either a poison or remedy. So, we need to know how much makes it a poison or not, so we do the dose-response relationships!
• Knowing the dose-response relationship is a necessary part of understanding the cause-and-effect relationship between chemical exposure and illness
• The toxic effects on an organism are related to the amount of exposure (the dose)
Education: promote seatbelt use, discourage impaired driving, promote child safety seats.
Engineering: vehicle crash worthiness, seat belts, airbags, locking seat belts for child seats.
Enforcement/enactment: passage and enforcement of primary seat belt laws, speed limits, impaired driving enforcement.
What are Means Restrictions in terms of suicide prevention?
Suicide magnets: a common place people commit suicide at. example: Golden Gate Bridge. (put nets up to limit access to these suicide magnets)
Extreme Risk Protective Orders (ERPO): if a court finds that a person poses a serious risk of injuring themselves, or others, with a firearm, that person is temporarily prohibited from having guns. (limit access to firearms for people at risk of harming themselves or others)
What is a HACCP plan?
This HACCP system focuses on procedures, putting the responsibility on food businesses to analyze their procedures and requiring government inspectors to verify compliance.
Identify potential sources of contamination and devise ways to avoid them.
Reduces need for inspection.
Explain an example of a vector control strategy for Adult Mosquito Control.
Traps, Toxic bait stations, or Ultra low volume (ULV) thermal fogging: disperses pesticide chemicals in the
air as a mist or fog
Please explain why children are more affected by poor air quality? (air pollution)
Typically children spend more time outdoors
Typically children are more active, which leads to greater exposure per time unit outdoors
Children’s lungs are developing therefore they are in a sensitive period for exposure; reduced lung function
Have occupational injury and illness incidence rates increased, decreased, or stayed the same throughout the past decade?
Decreased
List and explain some interpersonal (family) risk factors for mental health conditions.
• Severe marital disorder
• Overcrowding or large family size
• Parental criminality
• Maternal mental disorder
• Admission into foster care
Explain what the risk factors for foodborne illness at the industry level are.
Colonization- example: E. coli in cows or Salmonella in poultry. (presence of a microorganism on/in a host, with growth and multiplication of the organism, but without interaction between host and organism).
Farming- example: feeding corn instead of grass to cows; concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFOs), widespread antibiotic use in animals.
Mass distribution- small problem can become huge.
Cross-contamination – example: not wearing proper PPE.
Explain how climate and weather affect vector-borne diseases.
Climate: Constrains geographic range of the
disease. Range of animal reservoirs and vectors. Rate of vector population growth. Length of transmission season, etc.
Weather: Affects timing and intensity of outbreaks and epidemics
Other environmental factors that cause emergence of new pathogens: deforestation, crowding of livestock, travel, urbanization, etc.
List the 7 steps in the Exposure Pathway and give an example of each.
1. Contaminant Source = industry, tanks, drums, contaminated debris, unknown sources
2. Release Mechanism = emissions, spills, leaks, direct discharge, volatilization, burning
3. Impacted Media = air, soil, sediments, groundwater, surface water
4. Transport Mechanisms = dispersal & deposition, migration to subsurface soils
or groundwater, volatilization, runoff, uptake by animals or plants, groundwater flow surface water transport
5. Exposure Media = biota or water, surface or subsurface soil, indoor or outdoor air, groundwater, surface water, sediment
6. Route of Exposure = inhalation, ingestion, injection, absorption through the skin and eyes
7. Receptor Population = animals, humans, farmers, etc.
Explain one of the control strategies for occupational injury/disease (elimination, substitution, engineering controls, administrative controls, PPE)
Elimination (most effective): physically remove the hazard. Substitution: replace the hazard. Engineering controls: isolate people from the hazard. Administrative controls: change the way people work. PPE (least effective): protect the worker with Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
List and explain some of the host risk factors for substance abuse.
– Injury/Pain
– Family history
– Mental health condition
– Adverse childhood experiences
– Personality
– Tolerance/periods of abstinence
– Early age of initiation