One restaurant serving spoiled food can pass on disease to a large number of people in a short time.
So restaurant have to be inspected by expert from health department. You can expect food in restaurant to be safe because they are under supervision by authorities of health department. They don’t only supervise food in restaurant, but also in markets and the places where foods are made.
Sanitation in homes is important. It is difficult for health department to influence what happens in people’s homes. People can do a great deal about the conditions in which they live. Foods should be property refrigerated when necessary and shouldn’t be left lying around to attack insects and rats. To avoid these pests proper care of garbage is also very important. Regular visits from an exterminator may be necessary to keep insects away. Careful housekeeping is extremely important to sanitation and good health. All parts of the house should be kept neat and clean. Bath rooms and kitchens should be scrubbed often, and disinfectants should be used frequently.
The fight against disease germs is not the only part of the sanitation official’s job. Modern scientific discoveries have brought new health problems. Some of these are possible hazard of new drugs, the misuse of insect killers, harmful diet, air pollution, especially by smoke from industrial plants and exhaust from auto mobiles, pollution of rivers, and shore areas with sewages and chemical waste.
Sanitary conditions protect people from germs, but health problems not caused by germs are a growing challenge in the field of sanitation today.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Sanitation at restaurants and homes
Water purification
Methods were discovered for keeping water pure and safe. Septic tank, cesspool, and other equipments for taking care of waste were placed away so they couldn’t possibly drain into water supplies.
But germ still got into the water in other ways. Today water is treated in various ways to kill any germs that might be in it. Usually this is done with a chemical called chlorine. Only small amounts of chlorine are used, but sometimes its odor can be detected when water is run from the faucet.
In places where water is treated and purified, typhoid fever and other diseases spread by water have almost disappeared. When there are floods, the water purifying system may be overloaded and become ineffective. When this happened, people are usually told to boil water before drinking it, to make sure that all germs are killed.
In some parts of the world the water is not purified and can’t be trusted. Soldiers serving in such places use special chemicals to purify small amounts of water for drinking. Designing and constructing safe water supplies is an important job of scientist who are trying to improve health conditions in underdeveloped countries.
Making use of garbage
Disposing of the garbage we produce every day is a major problem in cities around the world.
In the United State, over 160 millions tons of garbage are produced every year. Ten percent is recycled, ten percent is burned, and the rest is put in landfills. But finding land for new landfills is becoming more difficult.
A city that has solved this problem in an unusual way is Machida, in Tokyo, Japan. They have developed a totally new approach to garbage disposal. The key to the operation is public cooperation. Families must divide their garbage into six categories :
1. Garbage that can be easily burned (that is, combustible garbage), such as kitchen and garden trash.
2. Noncombustible garbage, such as small electrical appliances, plastic tools, and plastic toys.
3. Product that are poisonous or that causes pollution, such as batteries and fluorescent lights.
4. Bottles and glass containers that can be recycled.
5. Metal containers that can be recycled.
6. Large items, such as furniture and bicycles.
The items in categories 1 to 5 are collected of different days, (large items are only collected upon request). Then the garbage is taken to a center that looks like a clean new office building or hospital. Inside the center, special equipment is used to sort and process the garbage. Almost everything can be reused : garden or kitchen trash becomes fertilizer ; combustible garbage is burned to produce electricity, metal containers and bottles are recycled, and old furniture, clothing, and other useful items are cleaned, repaired, and resold cheaply or given away. The work provides employment for handicapped persons and gives a chance to learn new skills.
Nowadays, officials from cities around the world visit Machida to see whether they can use some of these ideals and techniques to solve their own garbage disposal problems.
Litter is a problem in our cities
Litter is garbage like food, paper and cans on the ground or in the street. Where many people live together, litter is a problem. People don’t always put their garbage in the garbage can.
It’s easier to drop a paper than to find a garbage can for it. But litter is ugly. It makes the city look dirty, and it spoils the view.
The wind blows papers far away. Often they are difficult to catch. When they blow against a fence, they stay there. This fence is a wall of garbage. Litter is a health problem, too. Food and garbage bring animals, which sometimes carry disease.
Some people want to control litter. They never throw litter themselves, they work together in groups to clean up the city. In most places litter is against the law. The law punishes people who throw garbage on the streets. They usually pay a fine, and occasionally they go to jail.
