Think more of what you eat than what you wear in 2017

I observed with great concern the number of go fund me accounts created to help friends and families with organ failure get some help as I lost a school mate to kidney failure in 2016. Some even came with so much drama that it became embarrassing. I feel the pains of those people who have to go through caring for loved ones and looking for funds while at it.

Why do we have so much chronic illness more than before? Is it just the change of time and season or the new way to cut our population before we blow out? My sincere concern is that it may be from what we eat

Food is an essential contributor to human existence, It is the fuel for human growth and development, quality of life depends on food.As the human body absorbs nutrient from food for the body development, other constituents/elements in the food most especially, toxins are also absorbed. This is why body immunity and otherwise breakdown is majorly due to food ingestion. It is very true that contamination of food is a major cause in health deficiencies. As a matter of fact, food poisoning is estimated to contribute about two hundred thousand deaths to annual mortality in Nigeria. Agric products from Nigeria were rejected in Europe because of safety, think about it, if it is not safe for them, why should it be good for you here? Don’t forget export products will be about our best, so we probably buy and eat something of less quality to Europe rejects. So eating balanced diet or being on a diet of fruits is not enough, how sure are you that the fruits were safe to be consumed in the first place? The consumer has no clue what the food item he is buying has gone through! The type of pesticides used or the type of preservatives added! For example, what if the food was dried by the road side and contains animal dung and car exhaust? Or if the beans have been preserved with Dichlorvos, the active ingredient in DD force and Sniper? What if the animal slaughtered for your meat is diseased or contains drug residue? The consumer is buying blindly and unfortunately, there is no way to trace back! Some of the organs get overwhelmed while trying to fight the toxins over time, this may be the reasons for the excessive kidney failures, cancer and Liver problems we see now in our country. Obviously, food consumers in Nigeria have been buying and eating blindly, now we need to stop taking chances and make conscious effort to get safe foods. Choose what you eat right.

•       Efforts are on to work with farmers and food handlers to adopt best practices in food handling and you may contact me to partner or on how to get safe foods.

•       Please follow my series on food safety to know how to decide safe and unsafe food. You can also send enquiries to 08062755543 0r foodsafetynaija@gmail.com.

•       May we all be safe as we go into 2017, please make conscious effort in choosing what you eat much more than what you wear.