Penilaian kebersihan makanan di kalangan pengendali makanan di sekolah menengah sains negeri Johor Malaysia

The purpose of this study was to assess the level of knowledge and practices in food safety and hygiene and the presence of coagulase-positive staphylococci species on the hands of food handlers in Sekolah Menengah Sains in Johor, Malaysia. This study was conducted in two stages. In the first stage, 72 food handlers in those schools were given questionnaire to evaluate their food safety knowledge and practices in premise hygiene. In the second stage the presence of Staphylococcus aureus species on the hands of 24 food handlers was determined. The result indicates that majority of the food handlers have gone through proper Food Handler Training (70.4%). Another 29.6% of them did not attend any training but they have good knowledge in food safety and hygiene practices. The minimum result in the level of the right practices in food handling was good, which is 4.60 per 5 and above for every practices in food hygiene. The study reveals that there is no association between the socio-demographic aspects of age, gender and academic education with the level of knowledge of the food handlers. Despite a high of number of food handlers who received proper training and have positive attitudes towards food safety, 17.4% of the hand samples showed the presence of coagulase-positive staphylococci. Therefore, several technical actions need to be taken to improve the hygiene practice in food premises and to avoid the food poisoning cases in the future