Vets warn of dangerous meat in the market

By Antony Gitonga                                    

The next time you want to buy meat from your local butchery, be warned because you could be putting your life at risk.

The African Veterinary Technical Association has raised the red flag over the quality of meat being sold in the country, terming it as dangerous.

The alert comes days after a research conducted by various bodies found out that goat meat was highly contaminated with hard to kill disease-causing germs.

According to the association’s chairman Benson Ameda, meat inspection has become lax and there are fears the situation could worsen.

Ameda attributed the crisis to the move to devolve veterinary services, noting that this has compromised service delivery. “Some of the slaughterhouses are owned by the counties which have also employed some meat inspectors and it will be very hard for them to reject bad meat,” he said.

In an interview with The Standard yesterday, Ameda noted that the number of meat inspectors was low against the number of slaughterhouses and slaughtered animals. “At the current rate, one is safe in the war front in Somalia with Kenya Defence Forces than eating the meat that is being sold in our butcheries,” he said.

He at the same time expressed concern over the increase in drug residual in livestock products. He termed the issue as serious,  adding that this was affecting human beings and was one of the reasons Kenyan products could not access international markets.

He blamed the rise in the residual to the law which allowed livestock farmers to treat their own animals.

“Some of the farmers are using anti-biotic drugs on their animals and later selling them while the drug is still in the system and this is passed to consumers,” he said.

Quacks

Ameda said the law did not allow health technicians to treat livestock, a move that allowed quacks to infiltrate the sector.

“The law only allows veterinary surgeons to treat livestock but they are very few thus complicating an already worse situation,” he said.

A report by Kemri and Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology says that meat inspectors and food handlers are exposing consumers to fatal medical conditions.

The report notes that Kenyans could be infected through eating poorly cooked meals or unhygienic food handling.