PA Restaurant Inspection Reports Now Available Via New App

PENNSYLVANIA - If you want to dine out without worrying whether mice recently were scurrying across the restaurant's kitchen floor, there's now a way to check before leaving home. A new free app, EatSafePA, will allow people across the state to check restaurant inspection reports before choosing an eatery.

The app was unveiled Tuesday by the state Department of Agriculture and the Pennsylvania Food Merchants Association. Available in both the Apple App and Google Play stores, it allows users to enable their locations services or manually search by restaurant, business name, city or zip code to see restaurant and retail establishment inspection reports.

"Food safety is our top priority, it affects all Pennsylvanians,” Agriculture Secretary Russell Redding said in a statement. “EatSafePA gives Pennsylvanians easy access to the latest restaurant inspections no matter where they are in the commonwealth, allowing them to dine with confidence.”

Restaurants and other retail food facilities are inspected when they initially open or change ownership, after a remodel, and once annually thereafter via an unannounced inspection. Public complaints also can prompt inspections.

Even with inspections occurring nationwide, 48 million people get sick in the United States every year from foodborne illnesses, according to the Department of Agriculture. The app is a way to hopefully prevent some of those illnesses.

“At the end of the day, it’s about transparency,” Redding said. “Everyone deserves to know that the food they consume is prepared safely and isn’t coming with a side of illness-inducing bacteria.”