FSAI Warn Possible Presence Of Peanut in Batch Of Green Cuisine Mustard Powder.
Alert Summary dated Tuesday, September 24th 2024.
Allergy Alert Notification: 2024.A34 Allergen: Peanut Product Identification: Green Cuisine Mustard Powder; pack size: 40g Batch Code: Best before date: 16/5/2027 Country Of Origin: United Kingdom
Message: The Food Safety Authority of Ireland warn that the above batch of Green Cuisine Mustard Powder may contain peanut, which is not declared in the list of ingredients. This may make the batch unsafe for consumers who are allergic to or intolerant of peanut.
Food Safety Authority of Ireland recall a batch of Alameddine Tahina due to presence of Salmonella Muenster.
Alert Summary dated today Monday September 23rd 2024.
Category 1: For Action. Alert Notification: 2024.43. Product Identification: Alameddine Tahina, pack size: 400g. Batch Code Best before date: 13/04/2025. Country Of Origin: Lebanon.
Message: The above batch of Alameddine Tahina is being recalled due to the presence of Salmonella Muenster. Recall notices will be displayed at points-of-sale.
Nature Of Danger: People infected with Salmonella typically develop symptoms between 12 and 36 hours after infection, but this can range between 6 and 72 hours. The most common symptom is diarrhoea, which can sometimes be bloody. Other symptoms may include fever, headache and abdominal cramps. The illness usually lasts 4 to 7 days. Diarrhoea can occasionally be severe enough to require hospital admission. The elderly, infants, and those with impaired immune systems are more likely to have a severe illness.
Action Required: Retailers are requested to remove the implicated batch from sale and display a recall notice at point-of-sale.
Consumers are advised not to eat the implicated batch.
Ireland needs to tackle solid fuel burning and transport emissions to meet Clear Air Strategy ambition and protect public health.
Local authorities need to facilitate proactive choices on both home heating and travel, through strong application of the Solid Fuel Regulations and supporting alternatives to car travel.
Ireland’s latest monitoring shows air quality is in compliance with current EU standards, but achieving future targets will be very challenging.
While the overall level of air pollution has reduced over recent decades, our understanding of the level at which air pollutants impact health has also been deepened by the updated guidelines from the World Health Organization (WHO).
The EPA has expanded Ireland’s air quality monitoring network to include 115 monitoring stations, up from 29 in 2017, and now provides real-time monitoring and forecasting on airquality.ie.
The Environmental Protection Agency(EPA) has today published its annual air quality report, Air Quality in Ireland 2023. The report is based on the extensive monitoring network in Ireland, which consists of 115 monitoring stations, reporting hourly, and is a leader across Europe in providing a 3-day air quality forecast. The report shows that Ireland has work to do to meet our Clean Air Strategy targets. In particular, there are concerning localised issues which lead to poor air quality. While the overall level of air pollution has reduced over recent decades, our understanding of the level at which air pollutants impact health has also been deepened by the World Health Organization (WHO), which now advises that there are no safe levels of air pollution.
Ireland met the current EU legal air quality limits in 2023, but monitoring results were higher than the more stringent health-based World Health Organization air quality guidelines for a number of pollutants including: particulate matter (PM), nitrogen dioxide (N02), sulphur dioxide (SO2) and ozone (O3). The main sources of these pollutants are the burning of solid fuel in our towns and villages and traffic in our cities. In our Clean Air Strategy Ireland has committed to achieving the WHO guideline values by 2040, with interim targets for 2026 and 2030. Despite comparing favourably with many of our European neighbours, Ireland’s 2023 monitoring results would exceed the soon-approaching 2026 targets.
In 2023 air monitoring results from EPA stations across Ireland show that fine particulate matter (PM2.5), mainly from burning solid fuel in our homes, and nitrogen dioxide (NO2), chiefly from road traffic, continue to be the main threats to good air quality. High levels of these pollutants are often associated with cold, still weather from late autumn through to early spring, when generally incidents of poor air quality of one to two days duration occur. The report identifies that using less solid fuel and cleaner fuels to heat our homes, making our homes more energy efficient and reducing our use of cars to go to school, work and play are actions that will contribute towards achieving our Clean Air targets. Local authorities can facilitate people to make cleaner and healthier air quality choices by acting on the Solid Fuel Regulations and supporting alternatives to car travel.
Launching the report, Dr Micheál Lehane, (Director of the EPA’s Office of Radiation Protection & Environmental Monitoring), said: “Ireland now has a world class air quality monitoring network so the evidence base is strong in showing us that air pollution is not just a city phenomenon, there are negative impacts in towns and villages right across the country. If we want to achieve our ambition of Clean Air for everyone, everywhere, all year round, then we need to address the emissions from residential heating and invest in transport systems right across the country.”
The report further identifies the critical role for local authorities to facilitate people to make cleaner and healthier air quality choices:
Target air enforcement activities, including to ensure compliance with the solid fuel regulations.
Invest in public transport infrastructure across the country.
Promote active travel – install and maintain safe footpaths and cycle lanes to continue to increase active travel as a viable and safe alternative to car use and associated nitrogen dioxide emissions.
Ms Roni Hawe, (EPA Programme Manager,) said: “Progress on residential retrofit programmes will help to reduce fine particulate matter pollution but vigilance is also needed to ensure that only compliant solid fuel, such as low smoke coal and dried wood, is being sold to householders. In 2022 Ireland introduced new laws to reduce the pollutant potential of solid fuels. We need to see a strong inspection campaign by local authorities this winter to make sure all retailers only stock and sell approved solid fuel.”
To find out more about how we can improve air quality read the EPA’s How we can improve the air we breathe infographic or check out the Government of Ireland Let’s Clear the Air campaign which highlights some simple steps we can all make and help reduce pollution from solid fuels.
The Air Quality in Ireland 2023 report is available on the EPA website.
The EPA continually monitors air quality across Ireland and provides the air quality index for health and real-time results online. Results are updated hourly on the website, and people can log on at any time to check whether the current air quality is good, fair or poor.
On Monday evening last, at 14:21 hours, I was contacted (PM on Facebook) by Mr Jim Ryan, (Elected Local Councillor). He informed me that his associates had held a meeting ‘with a few experts‘, with regards to the state of the river Suir at Barry’s bridge in the town centre.
There was I thinking that I was going to be reprimanded, by my betters, for contacting the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which I certainly did, in an attempt to get some action in my efforts to save the decline of the River Suir and to lower, at least somewhat, the filthy stench currently being emitted from its murky waters.
No, thank God, the EPA hadn’t informed Mr Ryan directly, about my daring activities. Instead he was anxious to obtain images of sewage flowing into the river, which he had been fighting to correct for over the past 11 years; with his colleagues failing to support him and he without a camera of his own and no sense of smell.
In the course of our brief communication, I must apologise to Mr Ryan for misleading him. I had stated that I thought that the emissions from the area at the Emmett street “swinging gates” side of the river walk had been fixed. However, I also had stated that because of nettles retained by our local ‘nettle hugging’ biodiversity individuals, same could not be fully confirmed.
I am now happy to confirm, using the Thurles.Info satellite; that fixing this problem, requested on June 30th, 2022(view Here); on October 14th, 2022(view Here); on June 28th, 2023(view Here); and again on October 26th 2023(view Here), was simply too much of a challenge for our elected double jobbers; what with the war in Ukraine; the war in Gaza, not to mention Covid.19 and the onset of space tourism.
I now feel embarrassed, as I report that the emissions reported two years are still happily flowing, leaching into the water; only in larger amounts than was reported previously back in 2022. Again the nettles forbid me from seeing the actual pipe and my only pair of wellington boots have sprung a leak.
Archival picture of sewage entering the river Suir taken in 2022. Pic: G.Willoughby.
Same sewage photographed two years later on Saturday last. September 21st 2024. Pic: G.Willoughby.
Meanwhile, the person who sent men into the river, without supervision, on Tuesday and Wednesday of last week, should consider their position and resign.
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We had expected this workforce to return to complete their cleaning work on Thursday, and Friday last, but alas, no show; hope they didn’t pick up anything, forcing them to take sick leave. The reeds were cut, using strimmers, and left to float on the water’s surface, blocking the two fish runs, and forcing the main water stream to flow directly over the low weir. Branches were removed from under the bridges arches and left partially in the water and on the river bank. As our video shows, despite no rain over the past 7 days, water is still flowing from a drain under Thurles Swimming Pool, directly into the river, as is a stream of water from pipes under Barry’s Bridge, which we reported last January, (view Here).
Anyone Missing A Sock? No effort has been made to collect the numerous years of litter, piled and hidden in the receding undergrowth, found in the river itself and on its banks, in the form of plastic bags, tins, bottles, clothing, etc. One thing I did discover; while Red Bull liquid may give you ‘Wiings’, their empty containers remain fully grounded, when caught floating in existing Blanket Weed (filamentous algae).
Yes, the public are totally responsible for this littering, but what are we getting in return for vehicle parking charges and for local property tax, the latter which has increased in Thurles every year, since it was introduced in 2013 except during local election years.
Members of Thurles Tidy Towns, Thurles Gun Club and myself had worked for absolutely no recompense to make this same area visually beautifully, which Thurles Municipal District Councillors and their officials have now turned it into a cesspit, having removing all its assets.
It may now be necessary to put together a working volunteer group to save this wonderful asset, for according to Mr Ryan (Cllr.), despite being set up in 2016, the outfit known as the Local Authority Waters Programme (LAWPRO), have no immediate action plan in place and will require 4 months to make such plans, before urgent funding can even be applied for.
The body of man, aged in his 40’s, sadly found deceased late last Thursday night, on the grounds of University Hospital Limerick (UHL), (Latter the medical facility serving North Co. Tipperary), is believed to be that of a man declared missing from the mid-west region. A member of the staff at the UHL medical facility is understood to have discovered the man’s remains, before alerting the emergency services.
While the body; same located close to a helipad and a staff car park in the hospital grounds on St Nessan’s Road, has, as yet, not been formally identified; Gardaí suspect that the remains are that of a man who had been initially reported missing some weeks previously.
Gardaí are continuing to investigate all of the circumstances surrounding the discovery of the body, which has since been removed from the scene. A post-mortem examination by the office of the Limerick Coroner will now take place; the results of which will determine the course of any future investigation.
Yesterday, Friday September 20th, a large area, which included the staff car park and the adjoining the green area, presumedly where the body was located, remained firmly sealed off, with Gardaí maintaining a close presence at the scene.
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