Mercury that may be dangerous towards the creating fetus [10]. In Ghana, girls are expected to prevent particular foods when pregnant in specific cultures out of worry and belief that these could harm unborn kids [11]. Some other Ghanaian dietary taboos are that pregnant females are not expected to consume snail to avoid giving birth to drooling babies and young children. Among the Kassena and Nankana of your Upper East Region, pregnant females are restricted to vegetarian diet program; they must not eat meat and groundnut as this could bring about the birth of ‘spirit children’ (children deemed to possess spirits). In her study among the Akwapims, [12] observed that expectant ladies were forbidden to get tomatoes, pepper, okra and eggplant in the market place. If they did, it was believed that their young children will be infected with serious rashes and can consequently endure from some form of disability. Youngsters however are prohibited from consuming egg. Proponents argue that providing eggs to young children is linked with thievery when they develop up [9, 13]. Comparable taboos and restrictions have been located amongst the individuals of Anyamtan inside the Dangme West District. Other regional justifications (mainly from folkloric sources) exist in support of prohibitions of snails, okra, ripe plantain, and coconuts. Snails and okra are perceived to lead to the child to slime, although ripe plantain and pineapple are stated to cause waist pain, early labour or abortion. Coconuts however are believed could make a child blind, a Arteether site condition described as “white eye [12]. Though acknowledging the above, as well as other research on the topic in Ghana [147], it have to be noted that the many social, cultural, and linguistic groupings in Ghana may have distinctive food taboos, affecting vulnerable populations which include children, and pregnant ladies. Understanding about these group-specific practices are relevant for productive public overall health interventions in communities where such practices are typical. The nutritional hazards and well being implications of food taboos and preferences have already been extensively discussed [1]. When practiced in pregnancy, adverse consequences for instance depletion of important nutrients needed bythe mother and the unborn are most likely. A lot of the tabooed foods are crucial sources of protein. Protein, the nutrient, gives cell-building tasks for the growing child, in particular in brain improvement. As shown by the literature presented above, high caloric foods, foods wealthy in vitamins and minerals which include banana, snails and peanut are equally forbidden. Such foods play critical roles within the advertising, and preserving overall health throughout the many phases of life. Brito and Estacio’s recent operate clarifies the effect of meals taboos such as on prenatal nutrition. To our information, neither the extent of the practices of meals prohibitions in pregnancy in the Upper Manya Krobo, nor the health implications of your practice has been done. Although food taboos have deleterious consequences for maternal and child overall health outcomes, such taboos plus the motivations behind them have rarely been documented within the literature. Working with qualitative data from a rural Ghanaian district, we contribute towards the existing but scant physique of literature by documenting these taboos and PubMed ID:http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2129546 the motivators for such practices. Further, the study analyzes the conventional mechanisms for transmitting and enforcing food taboos.MethodsStudy type, population sampling and summary of field proceduresThis was an exploratory cross sectional study applying qual.