A pathologist and researcher at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Prof. Dr. Paul Osei Sampene, has warned about the devastating impact of illegal mining, also known as galamsey, on child development.

According to him, galamsey can cause child deformity during birth, affecting both the mother’s and father’s reproductive health.

Speaking on Channel One TV’s Point of View, Prof. Dr. Paul Osei Sampene explained that heavy metals released by galamsey can enter the body through contaminated food, water, and air.

He emphasised that these pollutants could accumulate in the body and affect the mother’s ovaries or the father’s semen, potentially impacting the formation of a foetus.

“We are looking at water, we are looking at the air we breathe and the food that we eat.  So all these three means by which the pollutants find themselves can either, thus by eating or inhale by breathing it or sometimes by drinking it from our water bodies. These are the vehicles in which the heavy metals can find themselves in the body.”

“So, if unfortunately, a mother or probably a father has this bioaccumulation of these heavy metals, it can affect the semen and sometimes the ovaries of the mother and then if that thing does not happen, as to whether it affects the mother and that of the father to give birth or cause formation of a foetus, then if the mother for some reasons inhale or eat contaminated food or water or inhale some of these things, it will then find their way into the placenta which will eventually go into the baby and form many deformities.”