CAGES OF SHAME

ABOUT BEAR BILE FARMING IN CHINA


The bile from the gallbladders of bears (principally Moon bears) has been used, along with other animal products, in Traditional Chinese Medicine for centuries. But it was only used occasionally. And then only when a wild bear could be captured and killed.

However, in the 1980s the Chinese government became concerned about the large number of bears that were being killed for their bile. So they decreed that, in order to preserve the bear population, it was acceptable to keep a bear in a cage. And, rather than kill the bear, its bile could be drained again and again.

Thus began bear ‘farms’, where a number of bears are kept permanently in cages and their bile drained and sold. And what the Chinese government didn’t count on was the utterly cruel ways that the bears are kept: often in tiny cages where a bear can hardly move; where the bottom of the cage is made of only bars, so that the bear’s feet become crippled; with never enough food and water; and with a tube permanently rammed into the bear’s gallbladder. A bear can suffer like this for up to 30 years...

Source: CAGES OF SHAME
Author: Documentary

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Link: Endangered Moon Bears Harvested for Bile in Vietnam
Link: Gervais In Tears Over Bear's Death
Link: Trailer