That fried lizard in your McDonald's happy meal won't kill you
McDonald’s is going to have a hard time luring customers with ads for cheap (and bland) junk food now, especially when you consider that the only free stuff you’re getting in your order of fries, is a dead and well cooked reptile.
February 28 was just another regular day in the lives of Kolkata resident Priyanka Moitra and her family, when they had gone out to a McDonald's outlet in EM Bypass area, to celebrate the birthday of their four-year-old daughter. They had ordered fries, perhaps the only yummy thing you can find in that food chain, but fate had other plans for them.
While they were having their meal, Priyanka's daughter noticed a dead lizard with the french fries on the plate.
"It was my four-year-old daughter's birthday on Tuesday. We had gone to the McDonald's outlet in Mani square, where we ordered burger and french fries. As we started eating, I noticed a dead lizard with the french fries, which got me vomiting. I immediately reported the matter to the outlet manager, who apologised and took away the order and offered to replace the same with fresh stuff,” said Priyanka.
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| Photo: Indiatoday.in |
According to an India Today report, Priyanka and her family have said that they will take up the issue legally with the fast food chain.
Priyanka, who is pregnant, fearing for the health of her family and her unborn child, clicked a picture of the dead lizard along with the French fries and lodged a complaint against the McDonald outlet with the Phulbagan police station.
"Filing a police complaint was important. People should know about this incident as consuming such poisonous food can be fatal", she said.
McDonald's in the meanwhile has issued an apology. The official spokesperson of McDonald's India (North and East divisions) has said, "We have been in contact with the customer and are taking the situation seriously. As soon as we learnt about the complaint, we launched a thorough investigation to gather the facts of the matter. Probe into the matter is going on and we are fully cooperating with authorities involved."
A deep-fried lizard in your food may be a considered a delicacy in parts of the world, but an unwanted charred gecko in your fries at a McDonald’s is anything but appetising. And the reaction of the “affected” family is one that is both expected and appropriate. But is the lizard a health hazard?
Nope.
Being yuck and being dangerous and poisonous are two very different things. Time and again we have all heard stories of people dying after consuming milk that was contaminated by a lizard. But really, there is no evidence to support those claims.
Hemidactylus - commonly known as house geckos, originally established by Lorenz Oken in 1817 – is the most dominant genus of reptiles we find across the Indian subcontinent. The common belief that house lizard or gecko would contaminate food by its presence is negated by the fact that it does not produce any venom or toxin, according to this paper.
That being said, there are risks involved when you eat reptile meat. Researchers suggest that the clearest microbiological risk comes from the possible presence of pathogenic bacteria, especially Salmonella, and also Shigella, Escherichia Coli, Yersinia Enterolitica, Campylobacter, Clostridium and Staphylococcus Aureus.
But the risk of contracting Salmonella or E coli is one that’s present with most kinds of meat, especially if the meat isn’t cleaned properly. Additionally, when a meat is deep-fried, more often than not, unless it’s really badly undercooked, all of these bacterial pathogens are destroyed.
This, of course, is really no excuse for McDonald's to serve us fried lizards. Really, McD's, this is the worst Happy Meal toy yet!