As reported cases of cancer increases across Nigeria, a food scientist in Akwa Ibom State, Mrs Idara Emmanuel Okon, has cautioned against consuming random food and drinks, noting that eating unwholesome items can lead to the disease.
Speaking at the 2026 graduation ceremony id Batch ‘A’ Students of IDYJAY Kitchen Culinary School in Uyo, over the weekend, Mrs Okon said cancer related aliments in the country are mostly caused and worsened by random eating of bad food and drinks.
“I am urging Nigerians and indeed the general public to try as much as possible not to eat food randomly, even water because what you take in will either make or destroy you.
“Increased incidences of cancer issues, such as cancer of the head, cancer of the lung, cancer of the eyes, etc, that are being reported in the hospitals are simply because of what you take into your system.
“If you eat unhealthy foods or drink unhealthy drinks, you will end up fast forwarding your death by having a whole lot of health issues as a result of destroying your system.
“It is not actually costly to eat a healthy food or drink a healthy drink but its costly, even more to be in the hospital to treat yourself of one ailment or the other. So you can save yourself all that by eating and drinking what is healthy,” she said.
Mrs Okon, who is the Managing Director of IDYJAY Kitchen Culinary School, said that the vision of establishing the institute was not only to train people to become entrepreneurs but to produce and serve what is healthy for the society.
“Here we have enough skills that we train our students in a lot of things. We train them on food safety, we train them on food hazards, we train them on food presentations, we train them on food quality and standards so that when they go into the labour market they can independently produce what is healthy for the society.
“In this field, certificate do not really count, it is what you can do on your own when you graduate that counts most because if you go for a job interview, you will be interviewed practically on what you can do,” she added.
