A member of the Parliamentary Health Committee, Dr. Titus Beyuo, has cautioned parents and guardians against bleaching their children’s skin in an attempt to make them lighter and fairer.
He outlined numerous health complications associated with the practice, warning that affected children are likely to suffer severe medical consequences.
His caution follows a recent investigative piece by JoyNews and Nigeria Health Watch, which revealed that some parents are using various substances to bleach their children’s skin, believing that light-skinned individuals are more socially accepted than those with dark skin.
Dr. Beyuo explained that skin bleaching in children can impair brain development and cause other serious health problems.
“That child may not grow optimally, that child may have a brain development challenge, that child may have water retention in their body, that child may have muscle waist pain and therefore may grow very lean, and that child may have hypertension — and hypertension we think is only in adults; you can have it in children — and imagine if you have hypertension at that early age; how long would you live with it? It will lead to problems like kidney failure and the rest, and the cancers,” he said.
He urged that existing laws banning the use of such creams be strictly enforced across the country. Dr. Beyuo also issued a stern warning to some medical and herbal practitioners who continue to sell these harmful creams and substances on the Ghanaian market.