Chinese medicine raising wildlife concerns II

　　Ninety percent of the musk trade is linked to TCM, which uses musk grains to treat heart disease and other complaints.

　　CITES officials say demand for TCM products is bein g driven by economic growth in East Asia, particularly China, where development is rapidly destroying natural habitats.

　　The fall of the Soviet Union also has brought lax r egulation in regions where many of the animals range.

　　Estimates of the TCM market range from $6 billion t o $20 billion and include China, Korea, Japan, Southeas t Asia and the burgeoning Asian communities of North Am erica.

　　Environmentalists are working with TCM practitioner s and the Chinese government to encourage herbal altern atives.

　　But with double-digit(两位数的) growth expected over th e next several years, and studies on TCM appearing in W estern periodicals(期刊) such as the Journal of the Ameri can Medical Association, experts say the threat to wild species is unlikely to abate.

　　Preservation movement energized

　　'Along with this has come growth in the use of wild life species,' said Ginette Hemley, vice president for species conservation at the World Wildlife Fund. 'The b ig concern has been with species that are critically en dangered. But now there are species that are not as yet critically endangered.'

　　A decade ago, illegal trade in tiger bones for TCM energized a preservation movement that stamped out any suggestion of legitimizing trade in tiger parts.

　　But animal activists are now concerned about farms that keep Asiatic black bears alive in captivity for th eir bile(胆汁), which is said to be effective against art hritis(关节炎).

　　The Chinese government, which describes farming as a way to protect wild animal populations, hopes someday to establish an international market in bear bile.

　　'If that were to happen, the wild population of bea r species in China—Asiatic black bears, brown bears and sun bears (马来棕熊)—would decrease as well as populations in neighboring countries,' said Phil Wilson of the Worl d Society for the Protection of Animals.

　　by David Morgan