The Food Safety Management Programs - Term Paper Example

Name: Tutor: Course: Date: Introduction Safety professionals and organizations confront the real-world challenges. Regardless of whether or not targeting the environment, consumers or employees, excellent safety performance is achieved through a well-developed safety management system as well as establishing clear communication links with management. The Food Control Section (FCS) of the Dubai Municipality is the state’s enforcement body that is responsible for ensuring all the food safety objectives within Dubai. This includes implementation of the food safety management programs as well as hygiene practices (Yousuf 3). HACCP’s implementation role in improving the compliance level of the food premises within Dubai Causes of biological hazards, and explain how they can be eliminated Biological hazards include viruses, bacteria, parasites and fungi that make a composition of food hazards that pose high risk of illness or injury. Such hazards largely vary in their prevalence, infectious dose, resistance to heat and chemical agents that involve food processes, action modes, and growth as well as survival characteristics. It has been argued that occupations involved in management of living things, products or food processing expose workers to various biological hazards. This implies that occupations deal in bodily fluids put workers at a high risk of biological hazards. Therefore, occupations exposed to biological hazards their workers are required to practice good personal hygiene. Biological agents commonly referred to as pathogens cause health problems such as bacterial diseases which include tuberculosis, tetanus, blood and food poisoning, viral diseases which include mumps, German measles and hepatitis, parasitic worms that live in a person’s body as their eggs become ingested as well as fungal diseases which includes ringworms and thrush (CFSAN 6). Effective control of biological hazards should involve the prevention of illness caused by the exposure to biological agents. This requires people to be cautious of their personal hygiene as it is considered the best way to avoid the spread of infectious disease transmissions. Work surfaces and spills should be cleaned with disinfectants, ensuring that equipments identified with the high probability of harboring bio-hazards such as fans and ventilations systems are regularly sterilize, cleaned as well as maintained, take immunization up-to-dates, handle and regularly dispose of waste materials that are bio-hazardous in a more safely manner (Scott & Stevenson 28). Source and key properties of viruses, parasites and fungi Bacteria are a category of biological hazards that represent the largest and highly diversified group of potential food hazards. Bacterial hazards are not only characterized as food intoxicators, but also as categorized in accordance to their growth temperature as well as survival characteristics such Thermophiles with optimum growth and high temperature of 45c, Mesophiles identified with optimum growth that ranges between 20c and 45c, Psychrotrophs which are Mesophiles that grow under the refrigeration conditions. Most of the food intoxicator pathogens are Mesophiles, though others are psychrotrophs which grow slowly under refrigerated conditions. It is important to note that bacteria vary in their capability to resist to food acidity, dryness, oxygen levels as well as other chemical required in handling or processing food. Viruses basically comprise of the protein and nucleic acids and smaller in size compared to bacteria. They also cause illness classified as food-borne infections. It is quite clear that viruses exists as host-specific or human viruses that affect the human hosts and associated with food through human waste contaminations (Scott & Stevenson 32). Majority of the food-borne viruses are not heat-resistant, do not necessarily breed in foods and can not survive for a long period of time without a host. On the other hand, parasites like viruses do not breed within food products, and thus depend on the host. Parasites cause illness classified as food-borne infections, though their susceptibility varies in relation to the host. Microscopic protozoan are the common parasites in food. However, nematodes, flukes and tapeworms are other examples of parasites associated with the seafood products in varying degrees. Fungi which are associated with foods include yeasts and molds. A great concern on food safety is given on mycotoxins such as patulin, aflatoxin and fusarin which are often produced by molds and they can cause chronic illness like cancer (CFSAN 8). Product liability, evidence and negligence and how they are related to safety regulations Product liability is an important area of production law through which manufacturers, retailers and suppliers are held accountable for injuries their products cause. It is indicative that regardless of contractual limitations of a given liability if the components of a product are defective, then its manufacturer is held liable for its damage caused to consumers under Consumer Protection Act (CPA) and common law of production negligence. Negligence, breach of warranties, strict product liability and misrepresentation are the key four principles underlying products liability suit. Based on functional terms and with exclusive of misrepresentation, all claims made on products liability are as a result of defects within the manufacturing process, product design as well as inadequate warnings. For example, negligence liability may be associated with personal injury caused by other people’s failure to act carefully under the required circumstances. This indicates that with negligence a person selling a product becomes liable if he or she fails to act in a manner that can avoid the creation of an unrealistic risk that cause harm or loss to other foreseeable users of the affected by products and in a more foreseeable way (Larson 34). Breach of Warranty is production claim made under the principles of contract in various ways. It is an expression warranty made at the time the seller creates a material representation, for instance, the composition, performance, durability and safety of a product. Strict product liability in Tort is given to individuals who sell their products identified to be in defective condition and unreasonably dangerous to consumers. Evidences of unreasonably dangerous are determined by assessing the consumers’ expectation standards such as answering questions like, is the developed products more dangerous to the extent that can be contemplated by any ordinary consumer who buys it based on the normal knowledge that is common to a given a community’s characteristics. On strict liability for material misrepresentation, a remedy is created to an individual injured because of reliance on misrepresentation of the material fact by the product seller (Kinzie 28). Negligence has been considered the most powerful speculation of recovery in the contemporary product liability legal actions. In order to prove a given negligence claim within the products liability case, the claimant is required to provide evidences that the supplier of a product totally failed to exercise the needed or reasonable care for his or her safety. For example, if the manufacturer was a defendant, the proof often provides evidence that such a defendant failed to act unreasonably when developing, or marketing a product proved to be defective. This provides the view that the collected evidences will either directly or occasionally create the components a negligence calculus such as the nature, magnitude as well as the likelihood of a given risk of harm. A number of aspects used in proving negligence within the products liability case operate in the same way as proving other strategies of the products liability claims. For instance, expert testimony is significant in proving negligence as it is useful in proving any strict products liability within tort or a breach of implied warranty (Moore 56). Examples of the different types of warranty used in the UAE industries In UAE, there have been no specific regulations enacted to govern product liability but today UAE is adhering to some classifications that are based on the global classifications. Additionally, various provisions have been offered to the industries such as Civil, criminal law and commercial dealing with products and product liability. For example, there are regulations governing deceptive practices within the commercial transactions that provide certain liability on distributors, manufactures as well as suppliers within the UAE. This is aimed at providing accurate information and the needed ingredients on the country’s origin, trademarks, material and substances sold in the UAE. As a result, strict liability is created on suppliers to reduce the fraud activities or improper information given to consumers and the entire public about a product (Peterson 28). The Commercial Agency law in UAE contains various provisions on the warranties and liability of principles and agents to deal with consumers or distribute goods under UAE Commercial Agency Law. In tort, the claimant is expected to be the contractual party, however, other people who may have been the end users of the product can be considered. This implies that a claim within a tort is only required to be a breach of the legal obligation by act, whereas the contractual breach is based on the breach of a specific terms and conditions agreed in a given contract. Although the UAE is controlled by a civil law, it has not yet endorsed a specific legislation on product liability. However, provisions on product liability are administered in other federal laws, for instance, in the Consumer Protection Law (CPL). As a result, the UAE has largely adopted various classifications of goods derived from the international standards. On the other hand, rights and procedures on filing the claims are supported by the Civil Code, Criminal Code as well as Transactions Code. However, there are no provisions given for class actions in the jurisdictions, nor the recognition of penal damages (Peterson 32). Law suit claims by consumers on faulty products, or any breach of warranty, is discussed based on the contractual and tort-related principles in correspondence to the newly endorsed Consumer protection Law. Suppliers and commercial agents are required to provide after sale services for goods sold as well as any contractual clause not claimed that contract will be considered void. In cases where suppliers identify defects within the goods and services offered, the law requires parties concerned to notify the department of Consumer Protection, consumers and other relevant authorities. Therefore, the law obliges that consumers be entitled to the right of discovering personal injuries and damages that arise from such defects. This is implies that it is easy under the UAE laws to exclude liability for a given personal injury or simply a damage to property. For any exclusion provided to the effect in the commercial contract can be considered void in regard to the UAE law (Peterson 46). The penalties against failing to adhere to the law involve financial penalties and criminal liability. It is quite clear that Federal and the local authorities are making efforts to promote the awareness of the Consumer Protection Laws among communities in the UAE, and thus providing consumers with more access to the needed remedies in case they fall victims to breaches of the law. It can be noted that the UAE laws on product liability are more consistent with those in other countries, for instance, suppliers are held liable for any damage caused to consumers in the UAE in using defective products. This indicates that products sold must comply with the UAE standards and have proper labels, leafleted as well as carry the required warnings. It is relevant to argue that while the consumer laws become more operational as the UAE consumers are considerate of their rights as well as pursuing them, the product liability will become increasingly visible (Moore 56). Some of the terms applied to record keeping and list include active records which are required for the daily functioning of a given agency or person. Appraisal is the process taken to evaluate various business activities in order to determine the types of records to be captured and the period the records must be kept and meet the business needs and organizational requirements of accountability as well as community expectations. Classification is the systematic identification and organization of the business activities or records into various categories based on the logically structured principles, methods and some procedural rules of classification system. Registration, classification, tracking and indexing are key control systems and processes involved in records management. The advantages of record keeping and report filing include recording incidents on the occupational injuries and illness and deaths provide distinct functions for OSHA, employers and employees. Through recordkeeping and report filing, information on hazards within the workplaces is kept by employers to help in putting in the necessary measures to prevent the injuries and illnesses their employees face. Furthermore, federal employees become informed through records kept and reports which are important sources of information of the Federal agency on safety and health of the personnel. Thus, the employees rely on the data to identify the highly dangerous worksites and safety inspectors to direct their efforts and measures towards the hazards hurting workers within the workplaces (Friedman & Fors 58). The main steps involved in the institution of a liability suit for a product or service in UAE A good number of people are injured while consuming manufactured products. Although such injuries are as a result of consuming defective products, one can easily be compensated for. Therefore, product liability has been considered a lawsuit in today’s consumer-driven economy. In the UAE, the well-developed product or service law is divided into three major types which include negligence, breach of the warranty as well as strict liability. However, the common steps involved in the institution of a product or service liability suit include, (i) Defect-where the claimant is required to prove that the product or service was truly defective (ii) Causation-the same claimant should show evidences of being hurt by the product defect (iii) Injury- requires the claimant to prove how he or she sustained the injury caused by a product defect (iv) Duty- the claimant must provide evidence that either the seller or the concerned manufacturer owed him or her duty to offer a safe product. A part from the injury, duty, causation and defects proves, negligence lawsuit based on negligence cases requires the claimant to prove how the manufacturer breaches the duty to him or her. This should show that the concerned manufacturer was aware of the product defect in regard to the available information but opted to sell the product or offer the service. On the other hand, the claimant should prove that he or she made a warrant with manufacturer of the product to include specific characteristics. Therefore, failure to incorporate the agreed features caused injury to the claimant to indicate the manufacturer breached the warranty lawsuit (Larson 38). Kinds of records and reports that safety inspectors are required to complete in the UAE Employers in the UAE are required to keep records and reports of every employee by providing a detail of employee’s name, date of commencement, profession, age, vacation, date of service termination and the associated reason, illness and injuries. A leave card for each employee must also be included in the file, indicating three divisional sections of annual leave, sick leave as well as other leave. Additional records and reports include a record for the work injuries listed or the occupational diseases reported immediately after employer’s notice. There must be organizational safety regulations regarding disciplinary measures which are permanently observed at the workplaces. A clear outline of the measures taken against individuals who violate the safety regulations is highly considered. Such records and reports are completed by the safety inspectors when auditing the occupational and health safety as well as regulation practices in organizations. Safety inspectors are required to complete records and reports on diagram of area, equipment and chemical inventory, checklists to enable them clarify their inspection responsibilities, control the inspection activities as well as provide a report on the inspection activities carried out. The inspection reports are significant because they can draw attention to the likelihood of hazards (Friedman & Fors 69). A Template of the Workplace Inspection Report Inspection Location: __________________ Date of Inspection: __________________ Department/Areas Covered: __________ Time of Inspection: _____________ Observations For Future Follow-up Item and Location Hazard(s) Observed Repeat Item Y / N Priority A/B/C Recommended Action Responsible Person Action Taken Date               Copies to: _________________ Inspected by: ___________________ Therefore, it is important for every employer to offer his or her employees with appropriate protection measures against occupational diseases, injuries, fire and hazards that may occur as a result of poor handling of machinery as well as other equipments within the workplaces. OSHA method for injury, and illness record keeping, and how could be applied in a real life Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) injury and illness recordkeeping agreement is an important area that emphasizes the principles of OSHA where recordkeeping regulations are controlled by the Agency. Today, employers are required to implement the principles of industrial hygiene and safety, hazard communization and occupational health as a way of responding to OSHA. Although OSHA allows various states to endorse their own occupational safety and health laws under the federally-approved plans. It is important for employers to take proactive steps so as to eliminate hazards. Such efforts are made to prevent accidents as a way to boost employees’ morale, control frustrating downtime and costly overtime as well as costs to be incurred on workers’ compensation claims. Statistics on injury and illness are used by OSHA. The data collected through OSHA Data Initiative (ODI) for effective direction of its programs as well as to measure performance. Additionally, inspectors rely on the data when carrying out their inspections as a way to direct their efforts to hazards-related issues hurting workers. Therefore, injury and illness records are important both for employers and employees in implementing their safety and health programs, particularly at individual workplaces. Today, analysis of such data is broadly considered a method for identifying workplace safety and health issues as well as tracking progress in the attempt to solving the problems (Peterson 87). A typical employer is required to develop as well as maintain the OSHA recordkeeping systems. The system is important for the general recording of various injuries and illnesses with more than 11 employees. Employers are expected to keep records required by specific standards on ideal for particular hazards. These standards include those that address the workplace exposure to work within the hazardous environments. Therefore, it is important to prepare the needed documents and recording of large amount of information. Employers are obliged to determine form of documents and records needed (Jackson 27). OSHA decision chart to record a real life accident case study Since employers are required to have a record of fatalities, illness and injuries which are work-related, meets the normal recording criteria of the Section 1904.7 and identified as new case, a Decision Tree becomes important in determining whether or not the employer must record an injury. The Decision Tree illustrated below is used to determine if a given injury or illness is truly work-related. Yes No Yes No No No Yes Yes In situations where injuries or illnesses occur within the work environment but not recognized as work-related, can not be recorded. Therefore, if circumstances such as at the time an injury or illness occurred an employee was within the work environment as only a member of the general public and not considered as an employee, the injury or illness originates from a voluntary participation through a wellness program or within a medical, recreational activity and the injury or illness is identified through symptoms that surface at work yet originate from exclusively from a non-work-related event that takes place outside work environment, the employer is not required to record such injuries or illnesses. Based on the general recording criteria, an injury or illness can only be recorded if caused by death, loss of consciousness, employee was off-duty, medical treatment that could not be handled through first aid, a significant injury or illness that was recognized by a physician and other healthcare professionals licensed to handle patients as well as in situations where work or job transfer was restricted. However, an employer is required to record a case if it concerns significant injury or illness that was diagnosed by licensed healthcare professionals or a physician regardless of the conditions it originates from (Seligman, Sieber & Pedersen 121). The OSHA classification of occupational illnesses to a given case study The OSHA form 300 is required to record all recordable occupational injuries or illness in a period of six days in operations after the employer discovers the occurrence. Arguably, the definitions of the recordable injuries and illnesses may appear to be straightforward, their applications are not. Based on the OSHA regulations, occurrences such as death of the employees irrespective of the time between his or her injury and death nor the period of the illness, occurrence of the non-fatal occupational disease which is a non-lost workday case due to job transfers, termination of the employment, in need of medical treatment, concerns loss of consciousness and incidences caused by significant injuries or illnesses that are diagnosed by healthcare professionals licensed to provides care services are recordable (Robert & Peterson 392). The key information collected on each recordable occupational injuries or illnesses has to be stored on the line of the OSHA form 300. However, the left portion on the form records an employee’s name, department, and type of occupation, a description of the injury or illness and the date. The employer is required to classify every incident based on the days the employee was recorded to be away from his or her duty as well as the days restricted of the work activity. For occupational illness, employers are required to provide information regarding the classification of the condition of the illness besides the number of days restricted of work. Generally, the classifications applied by the OSHA in such a case include, disorders caused by physical agents like loss of hearing due to exposure to chronic noise, respiratory conditions resulting from inhaling of the toxic agents as well as the systematic poisoning due to exposure to more toxic chemicals (Robert & Peterson 395). The incident rate, and severity measures for different industries in the UAE Incident rate is defined as the number of occurrence injuries and illnesses recorded among the given population of full-time workers over a period of time. Statistics on injury and illness rate is an important measure in the evaluation of the safety management system of an organization. Therefore, employers find it useful to evaluate the injury-and-illness statistical data of their firms over time so as to make a comparison of their statistics with that of the entire industry, and thus incidence rate becomes important as it can be helpful in the identification of problems within such workplaces or indicate the progress made in the attempt to prevent the work-related cases of injuries and illnesses. OSHA uses the same information to calculate or determine the possible penalty reductions (Rosenman & Kalush 367). Conclusion In regard to the above discussion, it can be concluded that biological hazards largely vary in their prevalence, infectious dose, resistance to heat and chemical agents that involve food processes, action modes, and growth as well as survival characteristics. Occupations exposed to biological hazards should advice their workers to practice good personal hygiene. Effective control of biological hazards should involve the prevention of illness caused by the exposure to biological agents. Product liability is an important area of production law through which manufacturers, retailers and suppliers are held accountable for injuries their products cause. UAE laws on product liability are more consistent with those in other countries. Recordkeeping and report filing provides important information on hazards within the workplaces, and thus enables employers to put in place the necessary measures to prevent the injuries and illnesses their employees face. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) injury and illness recordkeeping agreement is an important area that emphasizes the principles of OSHA where recordkeeping regulations are controlled by the Agency. Works Cited Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition. Food-borne pathogenic microorganisms and natural toxins handbook: The bad bug book. 2006. Retrieved April 15, 2012, from Friedman, L, S & Forst, L. Occupational injury surveillance of traumatic injuries in Illinois, Illinois Trauma Registry. J Occ Environ Med. (in press). 1995–2003. Jackson, L.L. Non‐fatal occupational injuries and illnesses treated in hospital emergency departments in the United States. Inj Prev. 26. 2001. 721–26 Larson, Aaron. Product Liability Law-Protecting Consumers from Defective Products. Law Offices of Aaron Larson. 2003. Kinzie, Mark A. Product Liability Litigation. Albany, N.Y.: West/Thomson Learning. 2002. Moore, Michael. Product Liability Entering the Twenty-First Century: The U.S. Perspective. Washington, D.C. AEI-Brookings Joint Center for Regulatory Studies. 2001. Peterson, Cohen. The Complete Guide to OSHA Compliance. Greenberg, J., Baron, RA., Behavior in Organizations, 7th ed., Prentice Hall. 2000. Rosenman, K.D, Kalush, A & Reilly, M.J. et al. How much work‐related injury and illness is missed by the current national surveillance system? J Occup Environ Med. 48. 2006. 365-367. Robert, D & Peterson, Cohen. The Complete Guide to OSHA Compliance. Lewis. 1996. P.395. Scott, V. N., & Stevenson, K. E. HACCP: A systematic approach to food safety. Washington, D.C.: Food Products Association. 2006. Seligman P J, Sieber W K, Pedersen D H. et al Compliance with OSHA record‐keeping requirements. Am J Pub Health. 78, 2000. 119-219. Yousuf, A.L, Rashid. HACCP Implementation’s role in enhancing the Compliance Level of Food Premises in DUBAI. Dubai Municipality Public Health Department. 2008. Pg.1-15 Read More