Uasin Gishu deputy governor Daniel Chemno is now advising locals to stop taking sugar until further notice.
This comes even as the country is gripped with fears over the safety of some of the imported sugar that is already in the market.
Speaking to the press in Eldoret town on Monday, Chemno said locals should avoid taking sugar or products made from refined sugar until when there will be an assurance from the government agencies that all the sugar is safe for human consumption.
“With what we are seeing all around the country about this contraband sugar, the best thing now is for locals to stop taking sugar and products like cakes and others where refined sugar I used.,” he said.
“Not taking sugar for a month or so won’t kill anyone,” added the deputy governor.
He also challenged all companies linked to importation of the sugar to withdraw all their products from the market and do a thorough research to ascertain the cause of copper and lead in the sugar.
“To restore consumer confidence, those companies should withdraw their products and find out why the imported sugar has those harmful elements. They can accept to incur loses but at lost last they will gain once the matter is fixed,” noted Chemno.
Several bags of sugar suspected to be unfit for human consumption has been netted across the country with the Kenya Bureau of Standards (KeBS) saying samples from the testes sugar indicate they had copper and lead which are harmful to human beings.