World news – Human placentas are seeing high demand in China as people believe that eating the meat would cure diseases

Although the Chinese government banned the sale of human placentas and made their consumption illegal in 2005, a large number of consumers are spending enormous sums of money on traders to supply them with human flesh.

The traders eventually contact Hospitals and funeral directors via back door canals and obtain human placentas, popularly known as « afterbirths of humans or by organs, » and sell them to their customers.

The black market for human placenta is alive and well as a large number of People in China believe that the organ that nourishes the fetus is rich in healing properties.

A growing number of Chinese people believe that consuming human placenta can cure diseases like tuberculosis, boost the immune system and also lead to a fertile reproductive system will contribute.

Known as « Ziheche » in traditional Chinese medicine, the ancient cult emphasizes Urelle belief that eating placentas makes people healthier, stronger, and free from all kinds of diseases. The illegal trafficking of placenta is mainly located in Bozhou in Anhui, Pizhou in Jiangsu and Yongcheng in Henan.

Through their contacts with return channels in hospitals, medical waste disposal facilities and funeral directors, traders pay to get placenta from cadavers and it does not verify that the organs contain viruses such as hepatitis B, syphilis or even HIV.

Despite knowing the health risk, consumers believe that cooking the meat and high steam cooking kills the viruses and is safe to consume.

However, an obstetrician found that this is not the case and the viruses remain in the meat despite cooking or boiling. While some cook the meat to eat, others powder it and use it in soup form.

« If the mother has infectious diseases, the placenta also carries the virus, » obstetrician Lin Xiu told a local media channel in China . « Traditional cooking methods cannot kill these viruses. Only the steamed disinfection that is used in hospitals to disinfect surgical equipment can. So if you eat fresh human placenta, you can potentially become infected with disease. This is harmful to your health, » she continued Continuing.

Philippines-based ABS-CBN Corporation quoted an unnamed man who said he has been selling human placenta for 25 years and that demand has never declined. He confirmed that he and his family processed 130,000 organs in the past year and is paying hospital staff to remove the organs.

The man also revealed that human placentas are now available for consumption in pill form, however the demand has not yet increased and it is positive that it will eventually catch up.