Take Me Back to Italy

Catherine Lang, Texas A&M University 

Experiences, Honorable Mention

With my first semester of my third year of veterinary school under my belt, I’m missing the time I spent in Europe. This summer, I had the opportunity to take a Food Safety and Public Health workshop at the College of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Padua in Italy. The class consisted of three students from Texas A&M, Dr. Christine Budke (a professor at Texas A&M that teaches Public Health to first and second year veterinary students), another student from St. George’s University in Grenada, and eight Italian students. The first week of the course we had guest lecturers speaking to us about different aspects of food safety and public health in Europe. The second week of the workshop, we toured different facilities where food is processed. This was my second time to attend classes at the University of Padua. My first visit was the summer of 2012 (the summer before my first year of Veterinary School), where I studied Physiology with two A&M professors; Dr. Herman and Dr. Hunter. It was great to go back and see some of the students I had met on my previous visit. This time, we had a different group of Italian students take the course with us and it was great to make even more connections in Italy. The students I studied with in 2012 and this past summer, will be visiting A&M the Summer of 2015 to do a two week rotation at A&M. I am very excited to return the favor and host them and show them all my favorite things in Texas.

The first week, we had Prof. Frans J.M. Smulders from the Institute of Meat Hygiene, Meat Technology and Food Science from the University of Veterinary Medicine in Wien, Austria speak to us about animal welfare, risk assessment and how to balance welfare and food safety when dealing with issues in animal production. Basically, he talked about what conditions animal welfare professionals would prefer and how that impacted food safety. Some conditions that would increase animal welfare, causes a decreased level of food safety, so it is important to find a good balance of providing good animal welfare, while making sure public health isn’t hindered. An example of this is bedding for food animals. Animal welfare experts would want bedding for food animals, because it prevents foot lesions and foot lesions lead to a poor animal status. Unfortunately, the presence of bedding would lead to a greater survival and accumulation of microorganisms, which would lead to decreased public safety. We also had lectures over the European Medicines Agency and their role in the marketing authorization of Veterinary pharmaceuticals. We had many lectures over EFSA (European Food Safety Authority) and how they are organized and how the regulate food in Europe.

The second week was more interactive, because we went to visit a beef slaughter house, a food producing company and catering business, a cheese factory, a chicken slaughtering facility and a guided visit of fish and shellfish processing. I really enjoyed visiting these facilities and learning about how they are operated. I had already reviewed videos of slaughtering facilities in some of my classes but it was very informative to actually get to walk around in these facilities. The common theme with all of these different facilities is how important traceability is in Food Safety and Public Health.

The program was only two weeks long, but I decided to make the most of my last summer and I traveled to Paris and Belgium the week before the program started and then went to Amsterdam and London after the program ended. I love traveling and had a great time touring around Europe this summer. I’m glad I extended my stay, to relax and come into third year rejuvenated.

This was an amazing experience and I am so grateful I was able to go learn more about Food Safety and Public Health. When I first came to Veterinary School I was strictly small animal and this experience has sparked an interest in Food Safety and Public Health. Since I’ve been back in the US, I’ve been doing a lot of research on nutrition and food processing and I find it very interesting and enjoyable. I highly suggest everyone take the opportunity to study aboard if you have the chance. I was fortunate enough to be able to study abroad twice and not only did a learn a lot about the subjects I studied, but I was able to immerse myself into another culture and learn their customs and how their day to day life operates.

"Exploring Amsterdam"