Swazi Observer

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MINISTRY LIFTS â€˜BANâ€™ OF POLONY, COLD MEATS

By ZWELETHU DLAMINI | 2018-03-18

The Minister of Health Sibongile Ndlela-Simelane has uplifted the ‘ban’ on processed meat products such as cold meat, polony, viennas, sausages and other cold meats.

The dropping of the ban may come as a relief to consumers and shop owners who had for the past weeks warned against selling and eating polony regardless of the brand.

The ministry had instructed that the products be removed from the shelves as they may have been contaminated by the other brand which had been labelled as poisonous.

After the meeting that was held in South Africa, Sibongile Ndlela Simelane at a press conference on Friday said it was safe to buy the products, but before this all retail stores need to clean their refrigerators and their storage rooms before putting in new stock.

Ndlela also said that these retail stores must also report on new stock that arrives to ensure that the stock is not from the previous contaminated batch.

The reports will have to include dates of the new stock. She confirmed that only two brands were found to be carrying listeria in their products these are; Tiger and Enterprise.

The minister said her ministry will also liaise with the ministry of agriculture in the producing of the products to ensure that the production of these products does not in any way jeopardise the health of the citizens. This she said would be done in every stage from packaging to delivery, these products will be given special attention.

She mentioned that there were resolutions taken to combat the situation.

The first resolution was that all state members should harmonise a way that will be used when implementing prevention programmes. The detection of these implementations should be the same. The second recommendation was the encouragement of cross-border collaboration amongst the state. This means that Swaziland would have to communicate with bordering countries.

advised

Thirdly, it was advised that the ministries should establish mechanisms that will help when the facilitation of the assessment, which approach will be used.

Experience sharing forums are also a resolution to such issues where the countries will be able to share their experiences and strengthening control over food production.

The most important was public education.

The minister said that the public should always be communicated with when it comes to health issues for them to have an actual understanding of the problem at hand.

The last one was to establish policies and practices that should be used especially by people handling food.

The regulations and guidelines need to be established and implemented firmly.

Ndlela said; “we will set up a council from different cadres especially cadres in food production. The council will be responsible for regulating the production of food and implementing all these regulations to all food production companies.”

Following the outbreak of listeriosis in South Africa, SADC brought in an invitation to all ministers of health in the region to provide reasons why they labelled it an outbreak and to outline steps to be taken to deal with the issue.

According to the World Health Organisation regulations of 2005 for a disease to be considered an outbreak it must meet one or more of five criteria, which in the case of Listeriosis only two of these were met.

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