The practice of skin bleaching is literally threatening the lives of unborn children in Ghana.
According to the BBC, government officials in Ghana are trying to get pregnant women to stop taking skin bleaching pills while they are pregnant. These women hope to make their unborn babies’ skin lighter, but medical experts warn that the practice can have devastating consequences.
The Glutathione pills, which have seen increasing use in Ghana despite being illegal, can lead to birth defects, including internal organ damage and damage to limbs.
In essence, these women are destroying their children’s quality of life before they are even born, all in the name of a beauty standard with racist roots.
Ghana’s Food and Drugs Authority (FDA) has officially warned women against the practice and stated that it wants “the general public to know that no product has been approved by the FDA in the form of a tablet to lighten the skin of the unborn child.”
Despite these warnings, however, the skin-lightening pills are often smuggled into the country in large quantities, often through airports, carried into the country in luggage.
Ghana’s police hope to crack down on the illegal practice with arrests and prosecutions, but in the meantime, women are still putting their children at risk.
Colorism is more than just a beauty debate
The development serves as an example of how racism and colorism can have far-reaching consequences. Even before black babies are born, they are already facing obstacles to their survival simply because of the color of their skin.
It’s a chilling and heartbreaking story and one that can only be addressed when we as people accept that black is beautiful and get rid of the damaging idea perpetuated by even the black community itself that your skin has to be lighter before society can accept you.
Our kids are literally at stake here.