By the bioMérieux Editors
Foodborne diseases—illnesses caused by the consumption of contaminated food—are an increasing public health issue. 1 in 10 people develop illness from contaminated food and over 420,000 individuals die due to a foodborne illness worldwide each year.
The contamination of food products can occur at any stage, including during the production, delivery, and consumption processes. Understanding and identifying the sources of foodborne illness is critical in order to protect consumers, limit the costly burdens of foodborne risks for producers, and enhance global food safety measures.
Diagnostic Testing for Food Safety
Limiting foodborne risks and costly recalls is important for both food producers and consumers. Through the use of rapid diagnostic testing methods, pathogens and microbial toxins present in food can be efficiently and accurately detected. The diagnostics process also helps verify the absence of toxins and bacteria to limit the risk of foodborne illness.
Diagnostic testing is essential for improving food safety and quality of products. Advancements in the field of microbiology and diagnostics continue to develop, and a new era of food safety testing has emerged. This era is defined by the empowerment of data and innovative technologies, allowing producers to adopt a predictive and preventive approach to diagnostics.
Changing the Game with Predictive Diagnostics
The food manufacturing industry is experiencing a transformation as new technologies, products, and data science are revolutionizing the standards of food safety and quality.
“With Predictive Diagnostics, we are working together with the industry to solve the biggest problems through cutting-edge collaborative approaches. This signals a bold shift for the food safety and quality community and is changing the way we work as an industry,” says Miguel Villa, Senior Vice President of Industrial Microbiology at bioMérieux.
Predictive Diagnostics utilizes customized data and a suite of diagnostic tools to provide precise, real-time insights and identify potential issues. By combining molecular innovations, genomics applications, and rapid R&D processes, Predictive Diagnostics can help deliver impactful and measurable improvements to operations.
A predictive and preventive approach facilitates:
- Better product quality, profitability, and efficiency
- Reduced risk
- Prevention of issues before they occur
This type of customized and collaborative approach can adapt to virtually any product, process, or facility. It is evolving the philosophy of food safety from a detect-and-respond approach to proactive prevention, enabling safer products and consumers.
Recognition for Innovation in Food Safety
For our work in the area of Predictive Diagnostics, bioMérieux is honored to receive the 2022 Food Safety Innovation Award from the International Association for Food Protection.
World Food Safety Day
The 4th annual World Food Safety Day is on June 7, 2022.
The internationally recognized World Food Safety Day is classified by the United Nations as, “an important milestone and a platform for raising awareness at all levels about the importance of food safety, and for promoting and facilitating actions to prevent foodborne diseases at local, national, regional and global levels; to strengthen global efforts for food safety to reduce the burden of foodborne disease.”
bioMérieux proudly celebrates World Food Safety Day, recognizing it as an opportunity to reinforce the importance of food safety through our mission to improve public health worldwide.
Opinions expressed in this article are not necessarily those of bioMérieux, Inc.
