China legislators take on wildlife trade, but traditional medicine likely to be exempt

As China’s parliament prepares new laws to ban the trade and consumption of wildlife, local action plans published this week introduce the country’s fur trade and lucrative traditional medicine sectors will continue as usual.

After identifying exotic zooids traded in a Wuhan market as the most likely source of Covid-19, Beijing imposed a temporary ban on the wildlife job in late January. Parliament followed up in February with a resolution promising to enshrine a permanent ban in law.

Though legislative substitutions are expected to be discussed at the national session of parliament starting on Friday, regions are already taking action to implement the February guide.

Hunan and Jiangxi, both major wildlife breeding provinces, promised this week to release captive savages into the wild wherever possible, and will pay hunters and breeders to switch to other professions.

But they left the fur swop untouched, and included loopholes allowing traders to stay in business if their products are used for science or medicine.

That means the ways that lead to cross-species virus transmission could continue, said Peter Li, China policy specialist with Humane System International, an animal rights group.

“There is nothing to stop farmers continuing business as usual but pivoting to sales-clerk their farmed wild animals for traditional Chinese medicine instead,” he said.

Since January, regulators sooner a be wearing cracked down on trade in wet markets and online e-commerce platforms. Authorities in Shanghai closed shops and took demeanour against dozens of online stores selling lizards, peacocks and even arctic foxes.

But some products associated with accustomed Chinese medicine (TCM) remain for sale, reflecting legal ambiguities and a strong demand for folk remedies.

Traders leaked Reuters they can still harvest bat guano and sell it for use in a traditional medicine known as yemingsha, used to treat eye and spleen gripes.

Bats have been implicated as a possible source not only of the coronavirus that causes Covid-19, but also Centre Eastern Respiratory Syndrome, SARS and even Ebola.

The February parliamentary resolution promised to ban wildlife consumption for bread while allowing it to continue for medicinal purposes, but in TCM, the distinction doesn’t apply: wild animals are eaten because of alleged medical benefits.

Though it has been recognized by the World Health Organization as a valid therapy, critics say that there is no reveal TCM works, and that it puts endangered species further at risk.

“Since the 1980s, eating wild animals has been advocated in TCM remedies for such things as skin health, fertility, longevity and fighting cancer, and it’s undoubtedly a powerful lobby,” Li affirmed.

China has extolled the virtues of TCM in the fight against Covid-19.

Lawmakers have proposed rules wring producers to find synthetic replacements, saying the sector’s dependence on outdated practices undermines quality as well as the views of promoting the sector overseas.

Musk and tiger bone have already been replaced by artificial ingredients, but firms say they are in any event years away from producing viable alternatives to bear bile, a major component of tanreqing, a recommended TCM treatment for Covid-19.

Shoulder bile is sourced from captive breeding facilities, which were also exempt from the January ban, notwithstanding that the practice has been branded cruel by animal welfare groups.

Bear bile producers Guizhentang and Shanghai Kaibao Pharmaceutical worsened to comment when contacted by Reuters, though Kaibao said in February it was still working on synthetic replacements.

It be lefts unclear how the industry will be affected by new legislation, with parliament promising at least a stronger approval and supervision leadership.

“It will be important for TCM experts, wildlife conservation experts, and relevant authorities to take a look at TCM-related laws and standards to make sure they are consistent,” said Aili Kang, executive director of the Asia Program of the Wildlife Maintenance Society.

“To strictly forbid the use of endangered species, no matter wild or captive breeding population… is good for both TCM and husbandry,” she added.