Food safety centre chief says contamination is low-risk
Compared with the risks of food poisoning, people have an irrational fear of food being contaminated by chemicals, according the head of the Centre for Food Safety.
Recent scares about the dye Sudan Red in eggs and the fungicide malachite green in fish have put the spotlight on the work of the eight-month-old centre, set up by the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department.
'If you talk about chemical contaminants as far as public health and food safety is concerned, it is relatively low-risk. So people are reacting disproportionately to chemicals found in food,' the controller of the centre, Mak Sin-ping, said.
'Food poisoning is different because you really get ill and if it's acute you can die. For example, if you talk about ecoli-017 [bacteria] it can kill the very young and very old.'
Dr Mak said the centre would enhance communication so the public could better understand food risks.
