Yafteh

Background: Pathogene transmission by ice, which has been attended for many years, is as important as its transmission by water. Ice infection is caused by using water distribution and translocation methods. The aim of this study is to evaluate microbial infections (Choliform variants) in ice making procedure at ice manufacturing houses in Kerman Province cities.

Materials and Methods: This study was cross-sectional and census method was used as data collecting method. Sampling was done in the first half of the year 2008 so that Choliform bacterial situation in four ice manufacturing houses at the cities of Kerman was evaluated. Water and ice samples collected from three different process of ice-making (entrance, processing, exit). Samples were taken in the first two-month of Spring and last month of Summer (each month, ten times).

Results: Results showed that 27 samples out of 120 samples had Choliform infection. Minimum infection was related to entrance process (approximately 7.5%) and maximum infection related to exit process (approximately 37.5%).

Conclusion: Results of the experiments showed that all of the ice manufacturing houses had Choliform infection. The least infection belonged to ice manufacturing house No 1 (18.18%) and the most infection related to ice-manufacturing houses No 2 and 4 (25% for each one ( . This study showed that in spite of low contamination in entrance stage of water, there existed a high contamination in produced ice.

Findings of this study showed that environmental contamination of ice-manufacturing houses and staff working there, can play an immense role in dissemination of bacteria, as well as water-borne diseases, so it is recommended to pay more attention to staff personal hygiene and environmental health of ice-manufacturing houses to reduce the risk of contamination