Eating frog legs could cause cancer, experts say

Panaji: Goa Forest Department have issued a warning to ‘froggers’ that eating the amphibian legs could cause cancer.

Around this time of the year poachers, with a torch in one hand and a bag in the other, slosh around marshy fields and open areas sodden with rain, hunting for frogs and their meaty hind legs. However, forest officials have issued an advisory which claims that eating frog meat could lead to an exotic cocktail of illnesses, ranging from cancer to kidney failure to paralytic strokes.

The advisory calls humans the “greatest predator” of frogs and their indiscriminate killing is drastically reducing the amphibian population.

“Massive toxic recalcitrant residues from agrochemicals biomagnified in the food chain get accumulated in fat deposits of frogs. Continuous consumption of frogs could trigger paralytic strokes, cancers, kidney failures and other deformities,” the advisory reads.

Over the years, the Indian Bullfrog and the Jerdon’s Bullfrog have been re-christened ‘Jumping Chicken’ in Goa. Both species have been hunted for their meat, which although contraband, is cooked and sold in several restaurants and homes.

A single frog is sold for up to Rs250 (Dh16) and only its meaty hind legs are cooked and eaten.

Listed as a threatened species in line with the tiger, the croaking of the humble frog when the monsoon begins would ordinarily attract its female mate. But in Goa, with the passion and demand for frog meat increasing, the mating call also attracts local villagers, who almost ritualistically head on frog hunts every year, risking punishment of a Rs25,000 fine and/or imprisonment up to three years under the Wildlife Protection Act.

Needless to say, although awareness about the importance of the frog for the region’s ecological balance has increased, arrests and deterrents have failed to stop eager ‘froggers’.

The forest department now feels that if the fear of a fine or arrest does not stop them, at least a cancer caution could stop people from killing and eating frogs.

“It is a health hazard in a way because the frogs exist in the fields and their bodies accept agrochemicals which are used liberally in fields. These are cancerous elements. We are hoping that people will take note of it,” a wildlife official said.

Miguel Braganza of the Botanical Society of Goa said the warning might just be a deterrent.

“Health risks may have been amplified to deter people from eating frogs because punitive action just does not seem to work,” Braganza said.

Animal conservationists such as Clinton Vaz have been at the forefront of the Save the Frog campaign for years. He says that along with the Indian bullfrog and the Jerdon bullfrog species, the Indian pond frog, grass frog and the common Indian toad are also occasionally poached.

“An insatiable demand at restaurants for illegal frog meat has ensured a lucrative return to the poacher for a pair of frog legs,” Vaz claims.