Salmonella in chocolate: The State Comptroller warned, the Ministry of Health did nothing

Unclear reporting procedure, ridiculous fines, a small number of inspectors and ignoring the State Comptroller's report, which seemed to predict the salmonella affair in chocolate - thus allowing the Ministry of Health to endanger public health.

Since the beginning of April there have already been 10 "recalls", about how many of them, apart from Strauss and Kinder, have you heard?

Liat Ron

27/04/2022

Wednesday, 27 April, 2022, 11:27 Updated: 11:48

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Everyone knows Strauss' "recall", and most of us know at least five of the company's products, which were suspected of being infected with salmonella and are on a list that gets longer every day.

But how many such "recalls" have passed us under the radar, even though these are products that could endanger our health?

It turns out quite a bit.

When there is no orderly procedure, prominent and significant publicity and clear rules, most messages from manufacturers and the Ministry of Health about dangerous products simply do not reach those who may pay for their health - the consumers, that is, all of us.

Those who trust the "recall", the product refunds, are the Ministry of Transportation in the field of vehicles, and the only one that also has a sanction on the public who did not respond to the call - blocking the possibility of renewing a license or transfer of ownership, the Ministry of Food and Drugs and the Ministry of Economy.

According to the law and procedures of the Ministry of Health, manufacturers and importers are required to notify the Ministry of Health of deviations in laboratory results first and if a decision is made to "recall", companies are required to publish the notice in two newspapers, the Ministry of Health website.

These calls reach the public only when it comes to very exceptional cases such as those of Strauss or Unilever, which journalists are quick to report.

The other bounce calls, some of which can hurt "only" allergy sufferers (for example), are swallowed up somewhere in the forgotten pages of daily newspapers, or under the label of "warnings" in the "Calls for food refunds" section of the Ministry of Health website.

How many of us regularly browse the Ministry of Health website to see if there have been any important "recalls"?

Presumably very few.

Therefore, relying on the good will of the reporters is very problematic.

Publishing an important news item about a "recall" can be marginalized or not published at all, because of more burning topical news, and on the other hand, media people may over-dramatize from a routine and not dangerous return reading.

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Why is there no binding procedure? (Photo: Reuven Castro)

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Due to the lack of clear procedures, manufacturers can elegantly evade the public reporting obligation.

"The registration holder will publish the wording of the notice in the written or spoken media according to urgency," the Ministry of Health's "Return from the Market" procedure states, "If necessary, the Ministry of Health will publicly publish the notice through its spokesperson."

Who determines what "urgency" is, and according to what parameters?

And what are the criteria for the "degree of need" of the Ministry of Health to publish the recalls to the media?

These gray areas create a large room for maneuver for manufacturers and the Ministry of Health, and the consumer, unaware of the details, may be harmed.

A source in the Ministry of Health explains that by law, if there is an immediate and tangible danger that a product is infected, the manufacturer must issue a return notice.

"Not all 'recalls' are about salmonella and pathogens," he says, "most of them are about labeling errors, for example a component of milk."

"It's dangerous so they must immediately update us and collect the products. The manufacturer is obliged to issue a notice to customers even before us and we publish the notice immediately afterwards on the website. Every recall of food goes out to the consumer public."

Indeed, anyone browsing the Ministry of Health website will find, as of today, 689 "recalls", ten of them only in April 2022, including Kinder's famous "recall".

A considerable amount that no one has any idea exists at all.

One could, for example, send messages to consumers over the phone, oblige manufacturers to advertise on TV to buy or banners on major websites.

The simplest way is to place warning signs at points of sale.

In the United States, by the way, there is a dedicated government website that coordinates the refunds, and the cost of setting up a similar Israeli website is marginal.

The director general of the Ministry of Health, Prof. Nachman Ash, promised to learn lessons. The question is why they were not produced before, when the State Comptroller explicitly warned? (Photo: Shlomi Gabay, Contact)

The State Comptroller has already warned.

So what?

The issue of product refunds concerned the State Comptroller.

In the annual report of 2020, the auditor examined the actions of the Ministry of Health to prevent health damage from exposure to pollutants and pesticides in food products. According to his findings, in two large-scale morbidity events that occurred in Israel in 2018 and 2019 The

five recall notices posted by the Ministry of Health on its website in 2018 and 2019 did not reflect the full information on the presence of bacteria and did not appear in English and Arabic. In addition, the auditor found that the Ministry of Health did not formulate a detailed procedure The system of financial sanctions and the enforcement policy towards producers, importers or marketers of food

.

"The ministry should regulate effective means of public information regarding the issuance of recall notices," the State Comptroller warned, "and that the information to the public on the Ministry of Health's website will be provided not only in Hebrew but also in other languages."

Summary of the report as if predicting the Strauss affair: “The deficiencies found in the audit indicate problems with the functioning of the public health services in the Ministry of Health, and in particular of the National Food Service, regarding the need to prevent consumption of contaminated food products to prevent disease.

The Ministry of Health must work to ensure that the National Food Service improves its control and supervision of food products, as well as the enforcement actions against food dealers who have violated the provisions of the law. "

One of the problems that the Comptroller did not address was the small number of Ministry of Health inspectors in the field of food trust in the audit.

The number currently stands at only 120 inspectors.

For comparison alone, the improvement of kosher supervisors in Israel is about 5,000.

More standards have recently been added to strengthen the system, but due to the low salary offered to inspectors, who prefer to work in the private market to earn more, they have been unable to staff them for several months.

The Ministry of Health claims that in the two years since the publication of the State Comptroller's report, they have worked hard to correct the deficiencies.

But the Ministry of Health can not replace the manufacturer.

The responsibility is his. "

" The manufacturer should be smart and the regulator should be smart too ".

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Tags

• Strauss

• Unilever

• chocolate

• Salmonella

• Recall

• Ministry of Health