FDA Food Safety Surveys

1
FDA Food Safety Surveys

• Sara Fein, Ph.D. Consumer Science Specialist
• Office of Scientific Analysis and Support
• Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition
• U.S. Food and Drug Administration

2
Type of Information

• Usual food handling behaviors
• Cross contamination
• Washing fruits and vegetables
• Cooking practices
• Thermometer use
• Cooling practices
• Storage times for selected foods

3
Type of Information

• Eating risky foods in the past year
• Undercooked or raw hamburger
• Raw hot dogs
• Raw sprouts
• Raw and undercooked eggs
• Other raw foods from animals

4
Other Types of Information

• Immune compromised status
• Demographic characteristics
• Age, gender, race,, education, income, household
  size, geographic region
• Knowledge of food safety issues
• Perceived risk from foodborne illness
• Experience of foodborne illness

5
Method

• Nationally (US) representative telephone surveys
• 4 waves of data collected
• 1988, 1993, 1998, 2001
• Sample sizes varied 1,620 - 4,482 per collection
• Adults only

6
Data Weights

• Each wave adjusted for design weight
• Number of adults in household
• Number of telephone lines
• Each wave adjusted for population distribution
• Current Population Survey gender, race,
  education
• Corrects for non-response bias

7
Exposure Assessment

• Risk of contaminated food depends on handling
  practices
• How likely consumers are to cook product how
  well
• How likely consumers are to cross -contaminate
• How likely consumers are to wash produce how
  effectively
• How long consumer stores product before eating
  (microbial growth)

8
Relevance to Children

• Sample is adults only
• Number of children lt 5 y and number 6 - 18 y is
  asked
• Some responses also apply to children living in
  the household
• Food handling practices - affect children
• Risky food consumption - adult respondent only
  no information about children

9
Risk Characterization

• Can estimate food handling safety of those who
  prepare food for high risk groups
• older adults
• young children
• compromised immune status

10
Strengths

• Unique source for national estimates of food
  handling practices
• Data are collected every 3-5 years
• Data are weighted to adjust for design weight and
  non-response
• Validity analyses conducted for practices
• Some comparable data available for Costa Rica

11
How to Access the Data

• SAS file
• Not public use data set
• Contact Amy Lando
• Contact information on the handout

12
Can You Collect This Type of Data?

• Survey has been modified for data collection in
  Costa Rica
• Much easier than dietary intake data collections
• FDA will give survey questions, detailed methods,
  other support. Contact Amy Lando.