Agenda Item 5	Conference Room Document 27 English only

second fao/who global forum of food safety regulators

Bangkok, Thailand, 12-14 October 2004

Epidemio-Surveillance of Foodborne Diseases and Food Safety Rapid Alert Systems

(Prepared by China)

The National Food Contamination Monitoring and Food Borne Disease Surveillance System have also been established since 2001. There are more than 70 surveillance points among 13 provinces in China, which covers about 643 millions population，as 50.8% of total.

According to the EU model WHO recommended, the data of acute food borne diseases were collected from 1992 to 2002. It was found that the microbial food borne disease was at the first position, and then followed by chemical food borne disease. There were 31.1% of food poisoning caused by Vibrio parahemelitics and 17.9% of caused by Salmonella spp. The most dangerous foods are meat and seafood.

Followed the "Food Hygiene Law of The People's Republic of China" and "The Management Means for the Food Poisoning", the importance food poisoning events, including the more than 30 cases, or a death found in an outbreak, or happened in the school, must be directly reported to the Ministry of Health. The general outbreaks could be reported to the local health agency.

In 2003, the reported events are significant more than those during the past years. Other than the events fact，it is important that The State Department issued "The Byelaw for the Meet an Emergency Outburst Public Health Happening" during the SARS prevalence. The situation of fail to report food poisoning is getting better, and the media made the strong support.

The Food Hygiene Law mentioned above is the general and key law on food hygiene. It covers topics such as food hygiene inspection during food production, manufacture and retail, licensing of food premises, food hygiene standards, material in contact with food, food packaging materials and equipment, and allow for regulations to be made on specific issues relating to food safety control. The purpose of food hygiene law is to guarantee food safety and to protect consumer's health. Food Hygiene Law does not cover the farming and planting process.

MOH relies on the support of the National Center for Health Inspection and Supervision, which is the main enforcement organization at national level, and Center for Disease Control, which is main technical organization on risk assessment at national level. Ministry of Health has published the Food Safety Action Plan in 2003, which includes all the aspects of food safety strategies and specific actions with the help of experts from WHO.