Wild game meat: Natural, healthy – or dangerous?

How the German Hunting Association also romanticises a product and downplays its risks.

Editorial team Wild beim Wild — 13 November 2025

The German Hunting Association (DJV) acts as the umbrella organisation for 15 regional hunting associations, with the exception of Bavaria, and represents hobby hunters.

In an interview with DJV President Helmut Dammann-Tamke, prisma spoke about the significance of the recreational hunting community and the growing, unhealthy trend towards wild game meat.

The hunting lobby likes to present wild game meat as “the most natural food there is” — regional, healthy and sustainable.

Yet a look at independent studies, assessments by regulatory authorities and investigations from recent years paints a far less romantic picture. In fact, game meat is one of the least regulated meat categories in Europe, and the risks range from contamination with harmful substances and pathogens to hygiene deficiencies in processing.

Nevertheless, the German Hunting Association (DJV) propagates a narrative that largely ignores, relativises or downplays these risks. For consumers, this can prove dangerous.

Lead contamination: A well-known problem that tends to be brushed aside

One of the best-documented risks is contamination with lead from hunting ammunition. Numerous scientific studies from Germany and across Europe show that wild game meat — particularly from animals killed with lead-containing rifle ammunition — frequently exhibits elevated lead concentrations.

The Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR) has been warning for years that children, pregnant women and frequent consumers are especially at risk. Pilot studies have found significantly higher blood lead concentrations in people who regularly eat game meat compared to non-consumers.

The DJV likes to emphasize that venison is “healthy and uncontaminated.” The fact that the association has simultaneously lobbied for decades against a ban on lead ammunition and continues to downplay the risks to this day appears to endanger consumers and represents, above all, the interests of the hunting lobby — not consumer protection.

Hygiene problems: Meat from the wild — without the oversight of the meat industry

The hunting association portrays venison as particularly “natural.” What the DJV rarely mentions:
Wild animals are not slaughtered in controlled environments, but in the forest, under variable hygienic conditions and without professional infrastructure.

The cold chain is often inadequate:

Game is sometimes transported warm in car boots for hours.
Gutting and butchering frequently takes place in hobby rooms.
Many hobby hunters possess neither professional refrigeration equipment nor routine experience in handling food.

Food safety inspections, which are standard practice in the meat industry, are largely absent. Veterinary studies confirm this: venison repeatedly shows contamination with salmonella, trichinella, hepatitis E viruses, and other zoonoses.

The DJV’s tendency to present such problems as “isolated cases” contradicts the findings of independent investigations.

Environmental contaminants: Wild animals are not organic animals

Wild animals are directly exposed to environmental pollutants: heavy metals from soils, pesticide residues, PFAS contamination from water bodies, and microplastics. Independent studies — from Germany, Switzerland, and Austria, among others — repeatedly reveal elevated levels of cadmium, mercury, and even radioactive nuclides in venison.

Despite this, the DJV claims that wild meat is a “premium product.” The reality is more complex — and often more uncomfortable for the hunting associations.

The myth of the “regional and sustainable” food

The DJV portrays venison as a sustainable alternative to factory farming. But the facts tell a different story:

The majority of roe deer, venison, and wild boar meat consumed in Germany is imported, often from Eastern Europe, where hunting practices and oversight standards vary enormously.
Recreational hunting does not produce predictable quantities, which is why the supposedly regional market barely exists outside of hunting season.
"Regional" does not automatically mean "healthy," particularly when ammunition contamination, parasite infestation, or poor processing play a role.

Game meat is not a certified organic product – even if the DJV likes to cultivate that association.

Downplaying by the hunting lobby: A structural problem

The DJV pursues clear economic and political interests: hunting is to remain socially accepted; game meat is to be regarded as a premium product. This interest leads to risks being routinely downplayed.

Examples:

The DJV emphasizes the lower fat content of game meat, but rarely addresses the real levels of harmful substance contamination.
It points to “official meat inspections,” even though these cover only partial areas (e.g., trichinella in wild boar).
It aggressively markets “premium quality,” even though the production chain is often far removed from professional standards.

This is classic image communication, not objective consumer information. The risks are real, well documented scientifically, and are systematically downplayed by the hunting lobby.

What matters for consumers is: