Coronavirus: still in the mood for bat? At Indonesia’s ‘Tomohon Extreme Market’ it’s on the menu
- Animals from cats to bats to snakes and monkeys are bludgeoned and torched in front of visitors’ eyes at this market, styled as one of the country’s ‘scariest’
- Before the coronavirus outbreak, it had been popular with Chinese tourists; now health experts are warning it’s a hazard waiting to happen
While scientists are still debating the origins of the coronavirus, it has been widely linked to China’s Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan City, Hubei province, the epicentre of the outbreak, and is thought by many to have jumped over into humans from either bats or snakes.
Since the first human cases emerged in December, it has killed nearly 500 people and infected nearly 25,000 across 25 countries.
Yet at Tomohon Extreme Market, both bats and snakes remain very much on the menu, despite experts’ warnings of potentially disastrous consequences.
“Tomohon Extreme Market and other markets selling wildlife in Indonesia are potentially breeding grounds for the coronavirus,” said Professor R. Wasito, of the Veterinary Pathology Department of University Gadjah Mada, Yogyakarta, who said the virus was known to exist in bats, pigs, cattle, wild birds, mammals and some fish.