Hazard Analyses of Foods Prepared by Inhabitants Along the Peruvian Amazon River

Abstract

Hazard analyses of food preparation practices were conducted in two households in Indiana (a settlement along the Peruvian Amazon River), in a household in a cluster of about a half dozen houses up river, and in three households in Belen (a district near Iquitos), Peru. These analyses consisted of watching all steps of the operation, recording temperatures throughout all these steps, and collecting samples of food and testing them for common foodborne pathogens and indicator organisms. Foods prepared included rice, plantains, yuca, dry fish, fresh fish, beef, and chicken. During cooking, foods attained temperatures of at least 93.3°C; they usually boiled. Such time-temperature exposure would kill vegeta-tive forms of foodborne pathogenic bacteria, but not heat-resistant spores. When cooked foods were leftover, they were kept either on tables or on the unheated stoves or grills on which they were cooked. During this interval, at the prevailing ambient temperature and high humidity of the jungle region, conditions were such that considerable microbial growth could occur. Time of exposure, however, limited counts to the 10 5-10 6 level. In the evening, foods were only mildly reheated, if reheated at all, so temperatures were not attained in the center regions of the food that would have killed microorganisms that had multiplied during the holding period. Hence, the primary critical control point is holding between cooking and serving, but cooking and reheating are critical control points also. The hazard analysis critical control point (HACCP) approach consists of (a) determination of hazards and assessment of their severity, and the risks they pose; (b) identification of critical control points required to prevent or control significant hazards; (c) establishment of preventive and control measures and criteria; (d) monitoring of each critical control point, and (e) implementation of appropriate and immediate corrective action whenever the criteria are not met. Hazards relate to contamination of foods by microorganisms and to their survival during processing and multiplication during storage. A critical control point is an operation (location, practice, procedure, or process) that if not under control could lead to unacceptable contamination, survival or growth of undesirable microorganisms. Monitoring is the checking that the process or handling procedure at the critical control points is properly carried out. This approach is applicable to evaluate food safety in homes as well as food processing and foodservice establishments (16). Furthermore, a FAO/WHO Expert Committee on Food Safety recommended that the HACCP approach be used in homes in developing countries to get a greater insight into hazards associated with food preparation and applicable preventive measures (7). The feasibility of using this approach in households was tested in Peru because of the country's diverse geographic and climatic conditions and the different cultural groups that live there. A determining factor for these diversities and differences is the Andes mountain chain which creates three natural regions: the coastal, the mountains and the jungle. Hazard analyses reported here were conducted in households along the Peruvian Amazon. Food-preparation hazards in households in the other regions were described in two related papers.