Health crisis looms as food handlers' certification platform down

 

City Hall's online payment platform has collapsed, disrupting the renewal of food handling certificates.

This has led to concerns about the safety of food consumed in the capital city and the lives of consumers. The e-Payments portal broke down two weeks ago, putting paid efforts by eateries to renew or apply for new food handling certificates on hold.

In a bid to speed up the processing of the certificates, City Hall last year went digital in the issuance of food handlers' certificates.

"We will be back soon! Sorry for the inconvenience, but we are performing some maintenance at the moment. If you need to you can always contact us, otherwise, we’ll be back online shortly!” reads the message on the site.

Efforts by some food handlers to seek help at City Hall were futile as they were turned away and told to wait until the site is restored.

"I have been to City Hall twice last week, only to be told to wait until the site is restored,” a food handler lamented.

However, City Hall has found itself in the spotlight when it comes to the processing of food handling certificates.

In November 2019, it announced it would go digital in the issuance of such certificates in a bid to speed up processing.

This came at a time when the Nairobi government had been on the spot for failing to test public food handlers for almost a year despite collecting the requisite fees.

Then-Health chief officer Mohamed Sahal said the move by the county to go digital is set to see the turnaround time from payment, testing and certification of food handlers reduced by 50 per cent.

Sahal pointed out that the digitisation process is being powered by National Bank in collaboration with the county and going forward the food handlers will now be required to pay for the food handling certificates online either through M-Pesa or other payment platforms.

“When this programme is implemented, the turnaround time from payment, testing and certification of food handlers will be reduced by 50 per cent,” he said.

In August the same year, Kenya Association of Manufacturers regional coordinator for Nairobi Robert Juma revealed that no public food handler has been issued with a certificate of good health for almost a year as the tests are rarely done by public health officers.

He had also faulted City Hall for its lack of capacity to test, track and have proof that one has been tested, saying the county government’s four licensed public laboratories capable of carrying out the testing are already overstretched.

BY THE STAR