What are the harmful effects of road side foods?

I am a lover of the regular and common road side Nigeria snacks

but sometimes I get disgusted at the sight of some certain things.
When I say road side snacks, I mean foods like roasted and boiled corns, fried yams, fried Akara, roasted plantain, puff puffs, fried fish and other snacks that are usually sold along the streets and at various bus stops. I can imagine what question is running through your mind right now-What else is left for us to eat?
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Yes, sometimes I share the same thought but regardless of how hard it is, the bitter truth has to be told. These snacks which are technically called “ready to eat foods” have actually become part of the regular diets of many folks particularly the rural and local dwellers. In my quest to unravel the rampant cases of food poisonings and health hazards, I have come to realise that many of the issues are due to these kinds of food with less cases associated with homemade foods.

Just some few days ago, I and my distant cousin visited somewhere in Shibiri (Lagos) in his car, as we both looked by our right while in the slow moving traffic, we saw a road side Yam and Akara (fried bean cake) seller. Just in the traffic, a faulty trailer was in front of us, which was producing some very thick, dark and dangerous carbon monoxide and had most of the gas directly deposited on the displayed foods. This happens virtually every time as the seller is just by the very busy road.
We all are aware of the state of our trucks, trailer, cars and even the Lagos commercial buses, popularly called “Danfo” as regards the quality of their exhausts. What of the dust deposit on some of these snacks? Only a few of the sellers cover the foods with a transparent nylon to provide some forms of shield. The deposits are seriously causing health hazards unknowing to millions of people on daily basis.

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Many of the women and men who sell these ready to made snack wear dirty aprons, rub their hands over it, use their hand to pick charcoals, clean up for their children particularly the women and eventually used these contaminated hands to touch and reposition the roasted corns or plantains to be package for customers. A colleague of mine recently had severe diarrhoea and he was quick to identify the source; a road side snack.
These roadside food outlets are making many consumers especially children and women vulnerable to fatal diseases such as cholera, typhoid and gastroenteritis. The utensils and containers used in making these road sides ready to make snacks are usually not very clean. For me, I love to eat these snacks but the thought of all these unhygienic handling deter me from enjoying them.
Well, if you must consume these snacks, chose to buy from sellers you can trust as regards how they handle the issue of hygiene in their production or cooking process.
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Credits: FoodsNG