According to the Ghanaian newspaper, MOH chief dietician Margaret Hanson said poultry produced abroad and frozen for long periods of time presented health hazards, including cardiovascular diseases, gout and obesity.
“The chief dietician said (...) the birds were fed with growth hormones, which increased their growth rate and thereby made them exceptionally bigger and with more fat. She said due to the long period in freezers and the medicine given them, “even the taste of the local bird and imported frozen chicken are not the same”.
“She said coupled with those problems was the fact that, because of differences in taste, Ghanaians were being forced to use a lot of seasoning, which also contained monosodium, an additive full of salt,” the Daily Graphic added.
Speaking at a Ghana National Association of Poultry Farmers (GNAPF) conference in Accra, Hanson urged consumers to buy locally produced poultry, implying that the price difference in favour of imported products was not worth the health risks linked with consuming them, the newspaper said.