Food Safety | Understanding Food Contamination

Food refers to all finished products and raw materials for human consumption or drinking, as well as items that are traditionally both food and medicine, but does not include items for therapeutic purposes.

What is food contamination?

Food (food) from its crop growth to harvesting, picking, production, processing, transportation, storage, sales to every link before consumption, due to various conditions, the role and influence of multiple factors, the originally non-toxic and harmless food is mixed with certain toxic and harmful substances, which reduces the nutritional value and hygienic quality of the food. Eating such food can bring different degrees of harm to human health. This process is called food contamination.

(I) Classification of food contamination:

1. Biological pollution: Microbial parasites, insect eggs and insects can cause biological pollution. Microorganisms mainly include bacteria and their mycotoxins, molds and their mycotoxins.

If these appear in food, they can cause food poisoning and zoonotic infectious diseases. Food contamination by parasites and worm eggs often causes roundworms, tapeworms, trichinosis, etc. in people through food.

2. Chemical pollution: including food contamination by harmful metals, non-metals, organic compounds and inorganic compounds, such as mercury, arsenic, lead, cadmium, nitrite, organophosphorus, organochlorine, etc.

3. Radioactive pollution: mainly comes from the mining, smelting, and application and discharge of radioactive materials in national defense, production, and life.

(II) Harm of food pollution to human body

The main sources of food contamination are contamination of raw materials, pollution during production, storage, transportation, sales, processing and cooking, as well as pollution caused by employees not strictly following operating procedures.

After food is contaminated, some of it will cause a large number of bacteria to multiply or produce endotoxins and exotoxins in the food. Eating such food will cause intestinal infectious diseases and food poisoning. Some food is contaminated by bacteria and will cause food to spoil after a certain period of time. If people eat this kind of food, not only will the nutrition be greatly reduced, it may also cause food poisoning and cause people to suffer from dysentery, diarrhea, cholera, paracholera, typhoid, paratyphoid, etc.