By Sara Sass*

The Lychee and Dog Meat Festival is held annually in Yulin, China. The festival started in the 1990s, but other Chinese dog meat festivals such as the Jinghua Dog Meat Festival were inspired by 600-year-old dog slaughter traditions.[1] In the 21st century, dog meat consumption is believed to be lucky[2] and its centuries-long traditional use for sexually impotent Chinese men continues.[3]

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China has no animal welfare laws.[4] In 2009, a Chinese draft law was proposed to punish animal abusers, including dog and cat abusers, with a fine. To date, the National People’s Congress has not passed or issued a statement on the draft law.[5] So the only available recourse for those affected by abducted pets[6] or diseased dog meat are through China’s 2013 Ministry of Agriculture regulations, which require laboratory quarantine for animals before transportation.[7] This regulation is not enforced at the festival, where live slaughter occurs without quarantine to ensure the meat is “fresh”[8]. China’s food safety regulations ban the processing, selling and serving of products from diseased or dead animals of unknown causes.[9] However, with 10,000 dogs transported in dismal, malnourished, starved, and cramped conditions to the festival for consumption, diseased animals are likely.[10]

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Yulin is in the top ten Chinese cities with human rabies occurrences.[11] Additionally Guangxi province, where Yulin is located, has the largest number of rabies cases in China.[12] The rabies spread is affected by the festival transport of dogs,[13] where a bite or lick to a human handler can spread rabies via saliva.[14] Cholera is also a concern. In a 2013 Al Jazeera article, Lola Webber of the Singapore-based Change for Animals Foundation reports dog meat consumers are at high risk of contracting rabies and cholera.[15] The World Health Organization (WHO) tied cholera outbreaks in Vietnam to consumption of contaminated food in 2008.[16] That year improper sanitation at dog meat eateries contributed to over 2,000 cases of cholera.[17] Cholera is spread by contaminated food or water.[18]

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The spread of cholera in coal mining has been recognized since at least 1855.[19] The UCLA Department of Epidemiology identifies the spread of cholera in mines, where “workmen stay so long in the mines that they are obliged to take a supply of food with them, which they eat invariably with unwashed hands, and without knife and fork” [20] Further, “it is very evident that, when a pitman is attacked with cholera whilst at work, the disease has facilities for spreading among his fellow laborers such as occur in no other occupation.” If coal miners catch cholera, due to “the propagation of the cholera in the crowded dwellings of the pitmen”[22] the mine’s workforce could be affected and the coal output can decrease.

Yulin is home to a large coal mining industry and workforce, with companies like the Yulin Liudun Coal Mine[23] mining high quality bituminous coal and China Coal Shaanxi Yulin Energy & Chemical Co. Ltd.[24] Coal giant ChinaCoal runs a major operation center in Yulin[25] and its coal output exceeded 100 million tons annually from 2007-2013. Currently, China accounts for 47% of global coal consumption–almost as much as the entire rest of the world combined.[27] Failing domestic coal mines might lead China to search for coal elsewhere.

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Yulin is a “coal boomtown”[28] so any cholera outbreak from infected dog meat could cripple Yulin’s coal mining workforce and affect China’s coal demand . This seems to be the concern shared by U.S. Representative Alcee Hastings, whose congressional resolution reads “the dog meat trade—the capture, transport, and butchering of dogs and the consumption of dog meat—poses a risk to human health by exposing people to a multitude of diseases, including rabies and cholera.”[29] .

As of September 7, 2016 the resolution was referred to the Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific.[30] If passed, the dog meat trade in China will be “condemned” and China will be “urged” to “end the dog meat trade.”[31] One of the measures considered in the resolution was for “the Government of China and the Yulin authorities to enforce China’s food safety laws regulating the processing and sale of animal products.”[32] This enforcement would likely lead to safer meat and a decrease in cholera and rabies spread by infected dogs, without the Chinese coal industry being touched.

 

 

[1] Jack Linshi, 6 Things You Need to Know About China’s Dog-Eating Yulin Festival, TIME, Jun. 18, 2014, https://time.com/2891222/yullin-festival-dog-meat-china/.

[2] Id.

[3] Chinese animal activists petition White House against dog meat festival in Guangxi, South China Morning Post, May 23, 2013, <https://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1244078/chinese-animal-activists-petition-white-house-against-dog-meat-festival>.

[4] Jack Linshi, 6 Things You Need to Know About China’s Dog-Eating Yulin Festival, TIME, Jun. 18, 2014, https://time.com/2891222/yullin-festival-dog-meat-china/.

[5] Id.

[6] Peter Li, Friend or food? Dog meat festival divides China, CNN, Jun. 19, 2015, https://www.cnn.com/2015/06/18/opinions/china-yulin-dog-festival-peter-li/index.html.

[7] Jack Linshi, 6 Things You Need to Know About China’s Dog-Eating Yulin Festival, TIME, Jun. 18, 2014, https://time.com/2891222/yullin-festival-dog-meat-china/.

[8] Li Hao and Lin Meilian, Animal lovers, local traditionalists face off at dog meat festival, Global Times, Jun. 26, 2013, https://www.globaltimes.cn/content/791868.shtml.

[9] Peter Li, Friend or food? Dog meat festival divides China, CNN, Jun. 19, 2015, https://www.cnn.com/2015/06/18/opinions/china-yulin-dog-festival-peter-li/index.html.

[10] Id.

[11] Peter Li, Friend or food? Dog meat festival divides China, CNN, Jun. 19, 2015, https://www.cnn.com/2015/06/18/opinions/china-yulin-dog-festival-peter-li/index.html.

[12] Id.

[13] Id.

[14] Jon Greenberg, Dog meat: Regional treat or global health threat?, POLITIFACT, Jun. 3, 2016, https://www.politifact.com/global-news/statements/2016/jun/03/alcee-hastings/dog-meat-delicacy-or-global-health-threat/.

[15] Maher Sattar, et al, Dog meat trafficking disgusts health experts, Al Jazeera, Apr. 2, 2013, https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2013/03/2013328132714178410.html.

[16] World Health Organization Global Task Force on Cholera Control, Cholera Country Profile: Vietnam, WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION, Nov. 25, 2008, <https://www.who.int/cholera/countries/VietNamCountryProfile2008.pdf>.

[17] Bridget Tobin, Cholera in the Developing World, The Borgen Project, Jul. 13, 2014, < https://borgenproject.org/cholera-developing-world/>.

[18] Cholera – Vibrio cholerae infection, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Oct. 27, 2014, https://www.cdc.gov/cholera/index.html.

[19] Mode of Communication of Cholera, UCLA Department of Epidemiology Fielding School of Public Health, last accessed Sept. 21, 2016, <https://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/snow/snowbook.html>.

[20] Mode of Communication of Cholera, UCLA Department of Epidemiology Fielding School of Public Health, last accessed Sept. 21, 2016, <https://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/snow/snowbook.html>.

[21] Mode of Communication of Cholera, UCLA Department of Epidemiology Fielding School of Public Health, last accessed Sept. 21, 2016, <https://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/snow/snowbook.html>.

[22] Id.

[23] Yulin Liudun Coal Mine, Bloomberg, https://www.bloomberg.com/profiles/companies/DULINZ:CH-yulin-liudun-coal-mine, last accessed Sept. 19, 2016.

[24] China Coal Shaanxi Yulin Energy & Chemical Co. Ltd, Bloomberg, https://www.bloomberg.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=171982562, last accessed Sept. 21, 2016.

[25] Coal Production, Sales and Training, China Coal Energy Company Limited, https://www.chinacoalenergy.com/n43830/n43854/index.html>, last accessed Sept. 19, 2016.

[26] Id.

[27] China consumes nearly as much coal as the rest of the world combined, US Energy Information Administration, Jan. 29, 2013, https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.cfm?id=9751.

[28] Coco Liu, Coal Boomtowns Fade as China Declares War on Pollution, Scientific American, Mar. 18, 2015, <https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-boomtowns-fade-as-china-declares-war-on-pollution/>.

[29] H.R. Con. Res. 752, 2016, <https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-resolution/752/text>.

[30] H.R. Con. Res. 752, 2016, <https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-resolution/752/all-actions>.

[31] H.R. Con. Res. 752, 2016, <https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-resolution/752/text>.

[32] Id.

 

*This article was written exclusively by Ms. Sass and does not necessarily express the views of her employer.

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