Masvingo City Council’s Health Department is investigating reports that a certain leading retail outlet in the Ancient Town could be using embalming substances to preserve its meat products.
This was confirmed by the city’s Acting Chief Environmental Health Officer, Ngonidzashae Mapamula. He said:
We cannot say much or which particular chemical was used at the moment as investigations are still going on but our health inspectors visited the premises soon after receiving the complaint from a resident who said they had just bought some chicken cuts at the outlet.
The argument is that the chicken was not attracting flies after news reports went around discouraging people not to buy meat which does not attract flies.
The development follows similar concerns in Harare that some unscrupulous butcheries and meat vendors were selling meat laced with formalin, a chemical used in mortuaries to delay the decomposition of dead human bodies.
Power cuts across the country have pushed these butcheries to use the carcinogenic substance thereby putting the health of residents at risk.