Cholesterol, BP and now...Health hazards from meat stalls
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, December 12 2013: Disposal of waste materials from meat shops where chickens, pigs and cattle are slaughtered into nearby drains has come to pose great health hazards.

Notably, a number of meat shops cum slaughter houses have sprung up not only in Municipal and Nagar Panchayat areas but also in all the markets of hill district headquarters in the past few years, with no body to monitor them.

It is understandable that the demand for meat has been rising on account of population growth but what is disturbing, as The Sangai Express discovered during a recent survey, is disposal of waste materials into road side drains.

Stalls selling meat

Apart from the absence of a separate site or house for slaughtering animals, there is no authority to check whether the animals slaughtered for meat are infected or not.

Moreover, most of the meat shops leave the meats open to the dust and others.

It seems customers too do not care whether the meat they are buying are infected or not.

They do not know whether the animals were cut into pieces after they died due to illness, said a Veterinary and Animal Husbandry Director.

In case the wooden blocks used for cutting meat are infected with germs, no amount of washing can remove the germs.

Consumption of infected animals opens a channel for transmission of different diseases to mankind, said the expert.

The Government has no idea on the number of meat shops opened in the State.

Animals are slaughtered and their meats sold without any regulations.

Such disturbing practice is further encouraged by lack of coordination among Government Departments.

The situation demands activation of food inspectors as well as food analysts to check whether different kinds of meat sold in the State are fit for consumption or not.

In case any of the animals slaughtered for meat and whose left overs were disposed in drains were infected, there is a greater chance of spreading diseases.

Even if the left overs get mixed with soil, it still poses health hazard, the expert said.

One medical doctor said that left overs of slaughtered animals can be the causal factors for many diseases and not just biomedical wastes.

Meanwhile, it is reported that employees working in Government offices near KRYPSA ground, Lamphelpat have been facing a crippling situation because of swarms of houseflies hovering in and around their offices.

Notably, waste materials collected from Imphal Municipal areas are collected and disposed at the ground.

Even the fan kept in the office of the Chief Electoral Officer was all covered with houseflies.