As super professor Schaffner would say, I’d like to see the risk assessment for this.

Food safety experts have suggested that freezing chickens during processing for human consumption could vastly reduce the chances of people catching a food poisoning bug.

Freezing chickens found with campylobacter cells in them could reduce the rate of passing the infection on to humans by up to 90%, according to Dr Frieda Jorgensen, from Public Health England.

In Iceland, chickens found to be infected with campylobacter when they reached an abattoir were not allowed to be sold as fresh or chilled chickens, but instead frozen.

That process does not happen in the UK, Dr Jorgensen said, partly because customers prefer chilled or fresh chicken, rather than frozen produce.

She said: “Freezing does bring about a reduction in the number of (campylobacter) cells. We believe that they can reduce that by 90% if you are undertaking this freezing process.

“And that reducing the number of campylobacter cells on the chicken can matter in terms of the public health risk.”