How does the role of the environmental health practitioner (EPH) play Essay

How does the role of the environmental health practitioner (EPH) play a part in protecting the health of the public - Essay Example They are liable for developing, implementing and enforcing health policies using specialist skills and knowledge to maintain and safeguard standards relating to people’s health and wellbeing. Environmental health practitioners implement prevention and strive for health wellness and promotion. Health prevention aims to promote healthy behaviours and foster safe environments that minimize the risk of diseases. Environmental health practitioners thus focus on the different areas of environmental health in protecting the health of the public, which include (1) Food safety, (2) Health and Safety, (3) Housing, Environmental Protection and (4) Public Health. The duty of the environmental health practitioner is to check food safety in all the stages of production from storage to distribution. They do this by implementing health protection by actions such as visiting food premises and advising managers on hygiene and safety. Moreover, they follow a regulatory framework for preventing infectious diseases in place. They also ensure food safety by educating food handlers, as well as raising consumer awareness on how to avoid food poisoning at homes. Additionally, environmental health practitioners ensure that food handlers and food premises follow laws and regulations regarding to food safety, imported food control, inspect premises to make sure that health standards are maintained, check to see that food is safe and take any suspected food if found, investigating possible offences and taking companies and individuals to court if they break any of the food safety laws (Meggitt 2003: 168). Moreover, environmental health practitioners enforce smoke-free legislation, investigate food poisoning outbreaks, develop policies to limit the number of fast food premises near schools and promote healthier menus (Mckimm & McLean 2011: 626-631). In regard to food safety, environmental health practitioners carry out food hygiene and standards inspections (Fiona & Wright 2014: