Italian Journal of Food Safety最新文献

Foodborne illnesses are responsible for about half a million deaths annually, of which 30% occur among kids. This study aimed to assess the current food safety knowledge and practice level of Saudi women in Al-Ahsa region, Saudi Arabia. A cross-sectional study was conducted through personal interviews among 239 Saudi women. The questionnaire consisted of close-ended questions covering different aspects of food safety knowledge and practices at home and during shopping. Descriptive analyses were used to identify the level of participant's awareness, and the scores were shown in three categories (good - fair - poor) based on their food safety knowledge and practice awareness. The effect of socio-demographic characteristics and their correlation to food safety knowledge and practices was conducted using Chisquare analysis. The results about food safety knowledge showed that around 50% of participants achieved a good score, and 37.5% achieved a fair score, while 12.5% achieved a poor score. In comparison, the participants achieved 75% good score, whereas 12.5% achieved both fair and poor in food safety practices. The results also highlighted a significant correlation (P<0.05) between level of food safety knowledge, practices of participants and their age, marital status, work status, and educational level, while there's no correlation with their family size and total income. Although, the overall result showed good level in food safety knowledge and slightly less in food safety practices among Saudi women living in Al-Ahsa region, continuous education, training, awareness, and motivation are highly recommended to improve women's knowledge and practices to higher levels.

The ingestion of synthetic microfibers, the most prevalent type of microplastics in marine environments, and natural fibers was assessed in Engraulis engrasicolus and Mullus barbatus, two commercially important fish species in the Mediterranean Sea. Microfibers were isolated from the fish gastrointestinal tract using a 10% potassium hydroxide solution. For the microfiber characterization, the evaluation of specific morphological features using a light microscope, coupled with the Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) analysis of a subsample of isolated particles, was applied. The preliminary results showed the occurrence of microfibers in 53 and 60% of European anchovy and Red mullet, respectively. A mean of 6.9 microfibers/individual was detected in anchovies, while on average Red mullet samples contained 9.2 microfibers/individual. The most common colors of fibers in both species were black, blue, and transparent. Visual characterization of fibers allowed the classification of 40% of the items as synthetic microfibers. FTIR spectroscopy confirmed the visual classification by fiber morphology. Microfibers were made of different typologies of polymers, represented by cellulose, cotton, and polyester. These findings confirm as the wide distribution of fibrous microplastics, and natural microfibers may impact both pelagic and deep-sea trophic webs. Despite the presence of microfibers in fish species poses a potential risk to human health, the literature is scarce regarding studies on the uptake by commercial marine fish mostly due to methodological issues. The visual characterization, corroborated by spectroscopic techniques, may be useful to differentiate synthetic and natural fibers, representing a fast and easy method to assess fibrous microplastic pollution in commercially important fish species.

Due to the close relationship between pets and humans, pet owners are highly invested in proper diets for their pets. Even though pet food mislabeling is concerning, there are few studies on this topic. This study investigated pet food mislabeling in South Korea's market based on DNA barcoding. In total, 10 pet food products were purchased, and 200 sequences of the partial Cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 (COI) gene were generated from clones of the samples. The obtained sequences were compared to available public databases to identify species present in the ingredients. The data analyses showed that the labeled species were consistent with species detected by COI sequences in 6 of the products. However, the expected species were not detected in 4 products, revealing possible mislabeling in these samples. Our findings indicated that DNA barcoding might represent a promising tool to detect pet food mislabeling.

Antibacterial activity of atmosferic pressure non-thermal plasma (APNTP) was assessed for bacterial, yeast and mold strains. This investigation is to be considered preliminary: a second step is envisaged in which the efficacy of the technique and the device will be assessed directly on food of animal and plant origin. The strains (ATCC or wild type) of Listeria innocua, Escherichia coli, Salmonella thyphimurium, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Staphylococcus aureus, Enterococcus faecalis, Proteus mirabilis (bacteria); Alternaria alternata, Aspergillus flavus, Cladosporium herbarum, Fusarium graminearum, Geotrichum candidum, Penicillium roqueforti, Rhizopus nigricans (moulds); Candida parapsilosis and Candida albicans (yeasts) were subjected to plasma plume generated by the action of electric fields with a gas mixture (oxygen and helium) delivered for 5 min at a distance of 2 cm. Types of experiments were listed as following: microorganism at concentration 1×10^8 and 1×10⁴ cfu on PCA (Plate Count Agar); Listeria innocua and Salmonella thiphymurium at concentration 1×10^4 cfu on semi-synthetic and synthetic medium; mycetes (moulds and yeasts) at concentration 1×10^8 and 1×10^4 cfu on SDA (Sabouraud Dextrose Agar). The results obtained on the bacteria subjected to atmospheric cold plasma were evident on all the strains tested except for Proteus mirabilis (1×10^8 cfu), most evident at a concentration of 1×10^4 cfu, not only on culture media PCA but also on semi-synthetic medium and jelly meat-PCA medium. In spite of bacterial results, treatment with plasma plume did not decrease or inhibit of fungal growth. That means plasma plume was neither fungicidal nor fungistatic activities.

This work describes a new methodology used in large scale retail trades in official food safety auditing processes developed during COVID19 emergency. The aim is to evaluate Food Business Operators' (FBOs) Food Safety Management System and its dynamic implementation and to understand the FBO's level of cultural maturity about food safety according to EU Regulation 2021/382. The innovation mainly consists of: a) a pre-audit phase when auditors analyse food business operator's (FBO) selfchecked plan and further documents to identify "markers" and useful evidences (that would be collected in on-site inspections) to evaluate the application of plan by FBO's workers; b) an audit phase consisted of both a check of the company procedures and documents performed by the auditors via web conference and of contextually onsite inspections in a sample of company's supermarkets performed by inspectors teams. The audit methodology here described may be useful, even though it is expensive in terms of time and energy used, for both Competent Authority (CA) and FBOs, regardless of the period of the COVID emergency. The so-structured official control allows the auditors to collect both documentary and on-site evidence at the same time, reaching a broader vision of auditees (not limited to single supermarkets) and a compliant with reality FBOs risk classification. The new approach may give advantages to both audit actors, CA as well as FBO, who may collect "markers" and evidence of the self-checked plan useful to improve FBO's food safety system on the basis of the critical aspects detected during auditing process.

Bread staling and microbial growth is a complex physiochemical change that occurs during bread storage mainly reducing the quality and consumer acceptance. It is significant to understand the causes of physical, chemical, and microbial spoilage of bakery products in the food industry, to prevent quality decay and economic loss for manufacturers and consumers. Traditional packaging has limitations in protecting and preserving the final products' safety, hygiene, and quality. Effective novel strategies must be included in food packaging, especially to minimize the organoleptic losses of baked foods during their shelf life. Furthermore, owing to the spread of foodborne diseases, which directly affect the safety of the products, customer demand is increasing significantly to reduce the use of synthetic preservatives instead of natural ones. Innovative packaging is altering the way food items are packed in several ways to extend and monitor product shelf life. Traditional packaging includes packaging food in synthetic polymer film; however, modern technology allows them to interact with active/functional substances. This paper discusses innovative bread packaging strategies such as modified atmosphere packaging (MAP), active packaging (AP), intelligent packaging (IP), biosensor, and nano packaging. Furthermore, MAP and AP have received greater attention in this study due to their considerable effect in prolonging the shelf life of bread and naturally preventing fungal activity, and have gained a lot of interest among producers and consumers in recent years.

Plastics are non-biodegradable polymers made up of different groups of petrochemical materials. Several biotic and abiotic factors can change the density of plastic fragmenting it and originating microplastics (MPs). MPs have been defined as small pieces of plastic less than 5 mm in size. Due to their small size, they are an emerging concern in the marine environment since they can be ingested by aquatic organisms, especially filter-feeding organisms, such as bivalve mollusks. Impacts of MPs exposure have been shown at various levels of biological organization, from cellular to tissue to individual and population levels. For example, oxidative stress and inflammation have been observed in copepods and mussels, obstruction and physical damage of the digestive tract were found in fish and swimming behavior alterations, disruption of foraging and feeding behavior and overall reduced fitness and survival were observed in fish and oysters. In addition, MPs can act as a vector for the transfer of chemicals to marine biota. The aim of the present study was the identification and quantification of potential MPs in shellfish harvested in Sardinia (Italy) by using transillumination stereomicroscopy. Bivalves were collected from 4 of the main production areas located along the Sardinian coast and selected according to the principles of the risk assessment. The results of the present study demonstrated the presence of potential MPs in 70% of the analyzed samples: the presence of MPs in bivalve mollusks may pose a threat to food safety, and there is an urgent need to evaluate the potential risks of MPs to human health.

Slaughtered animals are regularly submitted to post-mortem inspection to ensure that all the edible parts are fit for human consumption. According to Regulation (EU) No 219/2014, pig carcasses inspection is exclusively visual as palpation and incision could lead to cross-contamination and spread of relevant zoonotic agents. However, when compared to incision and palpation, the visual method is characterized by low sensitivity; thus, the omission of incision and palpation could lead to a reduced detection capability of organic lesions. This study aims to assess the effectiveness of exclusively visual inspection to mark pulmonary and hepatic lesions associated with low public health impact diseases in pork carcasses. A quasiexperimental- before/after research protocol has been used. All the post-mortem inspections have been carried out in a slaughterhouse located in the province of Teramo (IT), on 7,764 swine from 2011 to 2017. Carcasses undergone the only visual inspection have shown a statistically significant reduction (pvalue <0.0001) in the diagnosis of hepatic (decrease of 59%) and pulmonary diseases (decrease of 38. 5%). To overcome the limits of the low sensitivity of the visual inspection, as well as the inter-operator diagnostic variability, the high number of carcasses examined is proposed as a factor conferring external validity to the study, which provides quantitative evidence in support of the causal association between the modified inspection technique and the reduced diagnostic capacity. A further support derives from the assessment of the prevalence of hepatic and pulmonary diseases in species for whom the inspection technique is not changed.

Brucella infection in animals is considered a great problem in most countries of the world. Our study designed to determine the prevalence of brucella in field animal's milk in Dhamar governorate, Yemen. Total of 808 raw milk samples from non-aborted field animals, 120 milk samples from aborted animals, and 30 pasteurized milk samples were teste by Milk-Ring Test (MRT), milk-ELISA test, isolation and identification of brucella species, and antibiotic susceptibility. The prevalence of brucella in milk samples from field animals was 0.8%, 2.6%, and 2% in cows, sheep, and goat milk samples respectively with MRT, and 0.8%, 1.3% and 1.6% in cows, sheep and goat milk samples respectively with the milk- ELISA test. The prevalence rate in milk samples from aborted animals was 33%, 64% and 41.2% with the MRT and 39%, 49%, and 41.2% in cows, sheep and goats respectively with the milk-ELISA test. All pasteurized milk samples were negative for the milk-ELISA test. The result of isolation showed 0.1% of Brucella in milk samples from field animals while 9.2% from aborted animals. All isolates of Brucella species were sensitivities to rifampicin, doxycycline, kanamycin, gentamicin, streptomycin, tetracycline, and ciprofloxacin, while resistant to ampicillin, erythromycin, and novobiocin. In conclusion, the high prevalence of milk brucella especially in aborted animals needs focusing and build controlling strategies plans to decrease the losses to the economy and avoid transferred to humans with unpasteurized milk consumption.

The aim of the present study was to investigate the resistome and virulome diversity of 43 isolates of Listeria monocytogenes, Salmonella enterica and S. aureus collected from artisanal fermented meat and dairy products and their production environments in Portugal, Spain, Italy and Morocco. After DNA extraction, genomes were sequenced, and de novo assembled. Genetic relationships among genomes were investigated by SNP calling and in silico 7- loci MLST. Genomes of the same species belonged to different ST-types demonstrating the circulation of different clones in in the same artisanal production plant. One specific clone included genomes of S. Paratyphi B belonging to ST43 and repeatedly isolated for more than a year in an artisanal sausage production plant. No genomes but three (belonging to Salmonella enterica), were predicted as multiresistant to different antimicrobials classes. Regarding virulence, genomes of L. monocytogenes belonging to ST1, ST3 and ST489, as well as genomes of S.enterica enterica (ST43, ST33, ST314, ST3667, ST1818, ST198) and ST121 S. aureus were predicted as virulent and hypervirulent. The occurrence of virulent and hypervirulent L. monocytogenes, Salmonella enterica and S. aureus strains in artisanal fermented meat and dairy productions as well as in their finished products suggests the need for a specific focus on prevention and control measures able to reduce the risk of these biological hazards in artisanal food productions.