The recent crackdown on bad mattress production during which some Chinese nationals were arrested has opened the Pandora’s Box on substandard products flooding our markets.
Officials of the Ghana Standards Authority (GSA) who undertook an inspection of production lines of mattresses detected practices which do not inure to the interest of consumers. The stuffing in the mattresses were not wholly appropriate and could account for some health challenges suffered by consumers.
Orthopaedic defects in the spinal column have been said to be one of the drawbacks of the bad products.
Some consumers are said to have cut open their mattresses, following the crackdown, to determine whether or not they bought the right products. Just how they can do so without the technical eyes remains to be seen.
While we abhor bad publicity not founded on science and reality for businesses in which large outlays of capital have been injected and which are sources of employment for many Ghanaians, we would be quick to demand that best practices are adhered to because our health matter.
The GSA, by the discovery, suggest that they have been sleeping on the job for all the time the bad products were being produced and consumed. Well, it is better late than never but then let state agencies established to protect consumers and for that matter Ghanaians perform their roles efficiently. If indeed the bad products accounted for health challenges of consumers, the manufacturers must compensate the victims and apologise to them for their assorted predicaments.
The logo of approval from the GSA can only be respected when the officials are seen to be performing their statutory roles.
Ghana is in crisis in terms of dangerous and unwholesome products, some of which are responsible for many non-communicable health challenges.
The rising cases of organ failures have made worrying headlines recently, but these have not led to effective actions by the relevant authorities to address them.
The food we eat are hardly inspected for wholesomeness, leaving ‘chop bar’ operators to add whatever they decide upon to the meals they sell to consumers. Even kenkey producers add a chemical to make the products soft, which additive’s constitution is hardly known to the consumer.
With little or no knowledge of allergies, we continue to consume the same meals even when some of them are responsible for the reactions we suffer.
Although near impossible, we would nonetheless demand of the Food and Drugs Authority (FDA) to do more in ensuring good practices among ‘chop bar’ operators.
A Ghanaian top nephrologist who visited home exclaimed at the number of commercials on aphrodisiacs as though there is no regulatory authority. There are of course, but how effectively do they perform the tasks bestowed upon them by law and for which they are remunerated with the taxpayers’ monies?
The assortment of bitters and the sugarcoated audios accompanying them make them appear like elixirs even as we listen to the almost cacophonous commercials every other hour on our FM stations.
