07/11/2025
This year’s theme is ‘Don’t swallow the myth – Food safety myth busing’ and encourages consumers to not ‘swallow’ food safety myths.
There are an estimated 4.67 million cases of food poisoning in Australia each year that result in 47,900 hospitalisations, 38 deaths and cost to the economy of $3 billion. One of the most common myths is that food borne disease is a minor illness when can leave you with long term effects such as reactive arthritis.
Here are some more food safety myths:
• Hand sanitiser is better than handwashing: hand sanitiser is great if handwashing facilities are not available but remember that sanitiser does not work on highly contagious viruses like Norovirus which is only removed from your hands with handwashing with soap and running water and then drying thoroughly on a clean
• If you drop food on the floor it is ok to eat up to 5 seconds: Bacteria don’t politely wait 5 seconds to contaminate food dropped on the floor. Your floor will be contaminated from dirty shoes, by pets walking through and general day-to-day life.
• You need to throw out food after it’s best before date: Best before is only an indicator of quality and can still be eaten after that date but you should use (or freeze) food by its use by date.
• Hamburgers can be served rare Always cooked minced meat products such as hamburgers and sausages until they are 75°C inside because bacteria on the outside of pieces of meat can be transferred throughout the meat when it is minced.
• You can tell if food is contaminated because it smells or tastes ‘off’. You can get food poisoning from food that smells and tastes great. Bacteria can grow quickly in food that has been left in the temperature danger zone between 5°C and 65°C C with no change in the food’s smell or appearance. When food smells “off” it is usually due to spoilage bacteria growing and they may not make you sick.
• It’s OK to cut mould off of food: Even if there is only a small amount of mould some moulds make and release poisons, called mycotoxins, into the food that could, over time, make you very sick.
Learn more about food safety and test your knowledge and take the food safety myth quiz on the Food Safety Information Council website www.foodsafety.asn.au
