Incidence of Food Poisoning in Okene Local Government Kogi State. Nigeria.

Abstract

Food poisoning has been a growing concern in Nigeria today. The activities of some people and food processing industries contribute to the transmission of food poisoning and intoxication. There is lack of proper monitoring and supervision by food safety officers and the enforcement of food hygiene regulations. Descriptive cross-sectional study was designed to investigate the general awareness, attitude and practice of proper food hygiene among the adult between the ages of 18-38 residents in Okene about food poisoning. Multistage random and cluster sampling techniques were employed to select 460 respondents who were interviewed using a structured questionnaire. The level of awareness on food poisoning was found to be high (89.13%), but there are still reasonable numbers of respondent with poor knowledge concerning the causes of food poisoning. Food poisoning experience was very low (21.90%). Main sources of information concerning food poisoning were family members (80.48%) and radio stations 97.56%). Level of formal education had significant influence on the awareness of the respondents towards food poisoning (p=0.027). Despite the high level of awareness of food poisoning knowledge concerning the cause was perceived to be low. The practice of food hygiene was high despite the low knowledge on the actual causes of food poisoning. The attitudes of people towards food poisoning were positive and the people were willing to know about food poisoning and how to prevent it. Health education, general awareness campaigns and sensitization were recommended to improve the level of knowledge and further strengthen the awareness level among the respondents.