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APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Margaret Venuto, MA, MPH, Food Safety Unit, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Food and Nutrition Service, 3101 Park Center Drive, Room 512, Alexandria, VA 22302, 703.305.2894, Margaret.Venuto@fns.usda.gov and Brenda Halbrook, MS, RD, Food and Nutrition Service/Food Safety Unit, U.S. Department of Agriculture, 3101 Park Center Drive, Room 512, Alexandria, VA 22302.

The National School Lunch Program (NSLP) of the USDA Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) has the mission to provide healthy and safe food to millions of children. Approximately 100,000 schools participate in this large-scale feeding program involving 9,000,000 breakfasts and 29,000,000 lunches served daily and about 50% of all students participate in the NSLP across the United States. The Food Safety Unit of FNS monitors and ensures the safety of food distributed to schools. To successfully accomplish this task, data are collected, integrated, and analyzed from FNS and national foodborne disease surveillance systems in order to identify incidence and prevalence patterns in school settings. Key data sources include in the FNS Electronic Commodity Ordering (Complaint) System (ECOS), CDC's Electronic Foodborne Outbreak Reporting Systems (eFORS), and CDC's Foodborne Diseases Active Surveillance Network (FoodNet). The purpose of this paper is to present an original comparative analysis of data collected across all key foodborne illness surveillance sources and highlight patterns and trends unique to school settings to help define the burden of foodborne disease in school settings. In-depth analyses of these data are crucial in determining which foods and pathogens are most prevalent in the school settings, serves as an early warning of potential food safety issues, and speeds the response time and implementation of preventive measures associated with foodborne incidences. Data analyses include examination of foodborne disease characteristics in school settings; number/magnitude of school versus non-school cases and outbreaks by foodborne pathogen/etiology; implicated foods or food vehicle; and spatial and temporal relationships. In addition, Geographical Information Systems (GIS) analyses visually highlight the temporal and spatial patterns across data sources and serve as a basis for future trend prediction of illnesses. Results of data analyses serve as a basis for food safety education needs assessments to identify informational and educational gaps and to develop targeted food safety education materials that coincide with the food safety goals of Health People 2010. In addition, the results of analyses are used educate those involved in school food preparation and service and increase greater public and media awareness and influence policy decisions.

Learning Objectives:

• Provide an overview of key national foodborne data surveillance sources for school foodborne illness;
• Demonstrate the usefulness of data integration from key surveillance systems sources on analytical, temporal, and spatial (GIS) levels;
• Identify risk factors for foodborne illness in schools settings;
• Enhance the understanding of foodborne illness characteristics unique to school settings;
• Identify key food safety education and information gaps and potential opportunities for food safety education.

Keywords: Food Safety, Surveillance

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Not Answered