Bear bile farming in Vietnam police rescue bears cube

Subscribe http://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0nGJdPyjUFgOL37QQWGzHQ?sub_confirmation=1 Follow us TWITTER @newsdailyplanet Around 2,400 bears -- mainly moon bears, but also sun bears and brown bears -- are kept on bile farms in in Vietnam. The bears are milked regularly for their bile, which is used in traditional medicine. On the farms they are imprisoned in stark metal cages for their entire lives, which could be in excess of 25 years. To extract their bile, the bears are drugged and an ultrasound machine is used to locate the gall bladder; their abdomens are then repeatedly jabbed with 4-inch unsterilised needles until the gall bladder is pierced and the bile is pumped out of the bear's body. The bears' gall bladders are severely damaged from being repeatedly jabbed every few weeks and the process also leads to the dangerous leakage of bile into the body. In some cases, the result of this leakage is a slow, agonising death from peritonitis. The wounds from the unsterilised needles cause massive and painful abscesses and the bears suffer severe joint and muscle ailments from their inability to move freely. Their physical pain is compounded with the mental stress that this horrific situation causes and many bears end up psychologically damaged. Bile has been used in traditional medicine for over 3,000 years and is known to be effective in treating a range of liver and eye-related diseases. The active ingredient in bear bile is ursodeoxycholic acid (UDCA), which is found to be more abundant in bears than any other mammal and particularly abundant in moon bears. In the past, bears were hunted and killed in the wild for their whole gall bladders. But in the early 80s, Korea developed farms, soon adopted by China, in an effort to commercialise the production of bile to satisfy the local demand for the tonic. The practice subsequently spread to Vietnam in the early 90s. Many bears on farms today are caught in the wild either from Vietnam or neighbouring countries such as Laos, Cambodia and China. They are captured using a leg-hold trap -- a metal contraption that brutally traps and holds the animal alive in steel jaws. The bear is shocked, painfully gripped and restrained, all while fully conscious. Often the trap severs the bear's limbs. More common is the capture of cubs. The mother is killed and her cubs stolen and smuggled onto farms. Related: Three cubs rescued A driving force behind the ongoing poaching of bears is the continuing demand for bear bile from within Vietnam and also from South Korean tourists who are encouraged to visit a bear bile farm and buy some freshly extracted bear bile to take home. Due to a lack of law enforcement resources, bears continue to be hunted across the country for their meat and body parts and they are still captured for the bile farming industry. Today bear bile is completely unnecessary as there are over 50 herbal alternatives and many widely used synthetic substitutes that are equally effective, easily accessible and inexpensive. .