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Concern grows over unchecked Jakarta wildlife trade amid global outbreak
An animal welfare and rights activist has raised concern over the trade in exotic animals that continues unchecked at Jakarta's so-called "bird markets", despite the WHO declaring the novel coronavirus outbreak a "public health emergency of international concern” (PHEIC) on Jan. 30.
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A security officer stands guard on [DATE] at the isolation ward of Dr. Sulianti Saroso Infectious Disease Hospital in North Jakarta. The government has designated 100 referral hospitals for treating any novel coronavirus cases in the country. No confirmed cases of 2019-nCoV infection have emerged in Indonesia to date. (JP/Seto Wardhana)
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arkets trading in exotic animals – similar to the one suspected to be at the epicenter of the novel cornavirus (2019-nCoV) that emerged in Wuhan, China – are still operating openly in Jakarta despite the rising health and safety concerns.
The World Health Organization (WHO) declared on Thursday the outbreak of the disease, temporarily named the "2019-nCoV acute respiratory disease", as a global emergency.
“The animals that are traded [in Jakarta's markets] are the same as the animals traded on the Chinese market where the virus started,” Femke den Hass of the Jakarta Animal Aid Network (JAAN) told The Jakarta Post on Monday, referring to pasar burung.
“They’re doing exactly the same thing [as the Wuhan market]. They’re selling live animals straight from the wild to be eaten,” she added, and that the unchecked trade posed a serious public health hazard for the city.
Though they are called "bird markets", pasar burung are infamous for also selling live rats, snakes, bats and other animals – including protected species – for human consumption.
The virus, which has already claimed at least 213 lives and infected more than 9,600 people in China alone, has apparently been linked to a wet market in Wuhan where exotic animals were stored, slaughtered and sold for human consumption. The hypothesis, while still unconfirmed, has prompted global calls for a ban on the trade.
Den Hass, whose organization works closely with the government to protect animals across Indonesia, said the markets were a significant link in the supply chain for traditional Chinese medicine and were extremely difficult to shut down.
