M. Trevisani

Duties and functions of veterinary public health for the management of food safety: present needs and evaluation of efficiency

Functions of veterinarians in the context of food safety assurance have changed very much in the last ten years as a consequence of new legislation. The aim of this review is to evaluate the management tools in veterinary public health that shall be used in response to the actual need and consider some possible key performance indicators. This review involved an examination of the legislation, guidelines and literature, which was then discussed to analyse the actual need, the strategies and the procedures with which the public veterinary service shall comply. The management of information gathered at different stages of the food chain, from both food production operators and veterinary inspectors operating in primary production, food processing and feed production should be exchanged and integrated in a database, not only to produce annual reports and plan national sampling plans, but also to verify and validate the effectiveness of procedures and strategies implemented by food safety operators to control risks. Further, the surveillance data from environmental agencies and human epidemiological units should be used for assessing risks and addressing management options.

Probabilistic Models for Food-Borne Disease Risk Assessment

Risk assessment is a tool used by manufacturers, governmental, or regulatory bodies to evaluate the safety of food production systems and decide on strategies to protect consumers. This article presents a general approach to the use of probabilistic models to assess the risk related to specific hazards in some categories of food. It discusses their value in organising and analysing the scientific knowledge about the factors that most affect risk along the food production chain, but also highlights the data gaps that currently hamper accurate risk assessment.

Detection of Escherichia coli serotype 0157 in beef carcasses and faecal material.

S. Albonetti*, M. Trevisani, S. Alonso Alvarez and R. Rosmini Departement of Public Health Safety and Animal Pathology, School of Veterinary Medicine, University of Bologna, Italy *Correspondence: Dipartimento di Sanità Pubblica Veterinaria e Patologia Animale, Sezione di Igiene e T ecnologia Alimentare, Facoltà di Medicina Veterinaria – Alma Mater Studiorum, Università di Bologna – V ia T olara di Sopra 50, 40064 Ozzano Emilia (BO), Italy E-mail: salbonetti@vet.unibo.it