Where can employees wear hairnets?

Hello,

Are employees allowed to wear hairnets in the restrooms? 

Are employees allowed to wear hairnets outside the plant??

Thank you,

Hi TruptiG,

Employees should not wear hairnets, or any PPE, in restrooms. The reason is that contaminants from the restroom may get onto the hairnet, which is then exposed to food production areas when they return to work. The same applies to going outside; employees should remove smocks and hairnets when going outside. 

Instead, hairnets/smocks should be hung up outside of restrooms or before leaving the building. Then the employee returns to work, they can put their gear back on.

That's perfect. Is there anything to back this up, so I can provide to my hire management.? For SQF or Food safety?

Thank you

@TruptiG, here's a good breakdown of US Code regarding GMP control within a food plant:  Fish and Fishery Products Hazards and Controls Guidance Fourth Edition – June 2021 (fda.gov) Ignore the title as linked, the document is titled "ADDENDUM 2: CURRENT GOOD MANUFACTURING PRACTICES (CGMP)" and is a solid breakdown of what the FDA expects from plants following CGMP protocols.

It's rare we'll find plain spoken explanations as to why we should control specific cases.  Codes and laws are written broadly with the expectation plants will adopt individual programs to meet the codes.  As you read through, if you need to build a case to show your higher management why PPE shouldn't be worn in a bathroom, you can build the explanation by pointing to the following sections:

(b) Cleanliness. All persons working in direct contact with food, food-contact surfaces, and food-packaging materials must conform to hygienic practices while on duty to the extent necessary to protect against allergen crosscontact and against contamination of food. The methods for maintaining cleanliness include:

(1) Wearing outer garments suitable to the operation in a manner that protects against allergen cross-contact and against the contamination of food, food-contact surfaces, or food-packaging materials.

(6) Wearing, where appropriate, in an effective manner, hair nets, headbands, caps, beard covers, or other effective hair restraints.

(9) Taking any other necessary precautions to protect against allergen cross-contact and against contamination of food, food-contact surfaces, or food-packaging materials with microorganisms or foreign substances (including perspiration, hair, cosmetics, tobacco, chemicals, and medicines applied to the skin).

In short, we know restrooms are points of microorganism growth.  If the point of PPE is to protect the food from microorganism transmission, logic dictates we should keep PPE out of restrooms.  We know the outdoors are a source of microorganism transmission, so the same logic applies there too.

Interesting...  Now of course if there is a specific clause on hair nets or mob caps in rest rooms in SQF, then you need to comply but personally I'd say there is no risk.

In one plant I've worked in, we didn't just allow people to wear mob caps (non woven, solid hair coverings) in all areas, we encouraged it.  Constantly putting on and taking off the hair covering has the effect of having more hair fall out and risk more getting into food.

My argument is always this.  Do you wash your face when you go into the food production areas?  If not, why do you think the mob cap on your head is a risk?

Interesting...  Now of course if there is a specific clause on hair nets or mob caps in rest rooms in SQF, then you need to comply but personally I'd say there is no risk.

In one plant I've worked in, we didn't just allow people to wear mob caps (non woven, solid hair coverings) in all areas, we encouraged it.  Constantly putting on and taking off the hair covering has the effect of having more hair fall out and risk more getting into food.

My argument is always this.  Do you wash your face when you go into the food production areas?  If not, why do you think the mob cap on your head is a risk?

More of a matter that physical contact is not limited in those areas the same way it is in production areas.  You're allowed to touch your face in the breakroom, and other non-sanitary areas of the restroom etc. as well as your hair, but none of those are allowed in production.  You're probably also expecting them to wash hands when leaving the restroom and breakroom specifically to reduce contamination of garments and PPE donned for production.

Rather than trying to enforce a more complicated set of rules for if you touch A then you can't touch B when you're in C area, it is just simplified to "discard your hairnet" or "hang your hairnet and frock" outside production.

More of a matter that physical contact is not limited in those areas the same way it is in production areas.  You're allowed to touch your face in the breakroom, and other non-sanitary areas of the restroom etc. as well as your hair, but none of those are allowed in production.  You're probably also expecting them to wash hands when leaving the restroom and breakroom specifically to reduce contamination of garments and PPE donned for production.

 

Rather than trying to enforce a more complicated set of rules for if you touch A then you can't touch B when you're in C area, it is just simplified to "discard your hairnet" or "hang your hairnet and frock" outside production.

Let me play that back to you... "You're allowed to touch your face in the breakroom... as well as your hair but none of these are allowed in production".  Erm.  I take my face with me everywhere I go...

Look, ultimately it comes down to risk for most standards.  If you've assessed that risk, documented that risk and can defend it.  We successfully did so for 20 years in the one plant across 8 different standards and I introduced it elsewhere.  So I feel pretty confident I could.  But if you feel that control would be easier in your plant with your staff to have them removing it, then crack on.  But that's what it's really about.  It's not genuinely about risk.  I tell you now there are 100 higher ones in any food production facility than whether or not a mob cap is worn in a rest room.

Let me play that back to you... "You're allowed to touch your face in the breakroom... as well as [touch] your hair but none of these [actions] are allowed in production".  Erm.  I take my face with me everywhere I go...

 

...

Verb, not noun.  

Still don't get the point... sorry if I'm being dumb.

I'm with GMO, IDC if they wear their cap into the bathroom.   How in the world do you go to the bathroom where it's touching your hairnet?   Lol.   Same for outside.   They go out to smoke and come back in.   No biggie imho.   

This gets into a gray area of overkill in the industry imho.   I have to wear a beard guard if I have stubble on my face.   But the old lady who worked here before me had a straight up lady-stache.   Nobody ever has the cajones to tell her she needed to wear a beard guard.   And what about eyebrows?   They're more likely to fall out than my stubble, but there's no eyebrow nets...   What about arm hair?   Etc etc etc.....

in restroom before entering into the production area.