Several practitioners of traditional Chinese medicine in China believe that bile extracted from the gall bladder of a bear has important medicinal properties, and is used in treatment of eye, liver and other ailments. A number of Chinese medicines have bear bile as a vital ingredient. The bear species from which the bile is extracted is the Asiatic black bear, which, strangely enough, is listed as an endangered species in China itself. These rare bears are also known as “moon bears” due to a colored crescent mark on the chest.
There exist a number of bear bile farms in China where the bears are kept in small cages that just about fit their size, throughout their lives, with a metal catheter implanted directly into the abdomen, from which bile is periodically collected.
The EU member countries have issued a joint statement calling China to stop the cruel practice and phase out bear bile farms. The Chinese government officials have retorted that this will not be done.
Wang Wei, the deputy director-general of china’s Department of Wildlife Conservation has said “We have introduced painless practices of extracting bear bile, and unless we find suitable alternatives to bear bile, we cannot accept the EU resolution that urges elimination of bear bile”.
Jill Robinson of the Hong-Kong based Animals Asia Foundation however, stresses that bear bile is easily replaced by cheaper herbal or even synthetic substances, reflecting his experience with Chinese doctors in Hong Kong.
The bear farms were encouraged by the Chinese government as a step to protect the endangered bear species, but the appalling conditions under which the bears were kept, as bile producing machines, almost always infected themselves, led to an outcry by environmentalists. Though China, following the protests by conservation groups, did reduce the number of bear farms, it has stonewalled the demand to abolish bear farming.
A picture showing a moon bear in a cage in a Chinese bile farm. (credit ww2.wspa-international.org.)
