Dirt, Death And Disease? The Truth About China's Wet Markets

Since COVID-19 was first detected at a wildlife market in Wuhan, China’s food systems have come under intense scrutiny. But are calls for a blanket ban on the country’s so-called “wet markets”, many run by women, really warranted? Crystal Reid investigates

- Crystal Reid

Amesh plastic bag pulsates on the slick tiled floor. Inside, a mound of bullfrogs waits, motionless apart from the darting of their eyes and the bulging of their throats. Above them, tiny crabs clamber over one another in a polystyrene tub, while eels flip in a bucket and a river fish is stunned, gutted, and descaled on a chopping board stained red with guts. Today, these are the only live animals available for sale in the newly reopened wet markets of Wuhan in China’s central Hubei province – but the city’s shopping scene wasn’t always so tame.

Across town is the now-infamous Huanan Seafood Market, suspected to be the first epicentre of the deadly COVID-19 outbreak. It’s swept across the world and taken hundreds of thousands of lives since Wuhan health officials issued an alert of a new virus on December 31, 2019. While most of the market was indeed dedicated to fish, shoppers could find live porcupines, bats, snakes, and more in tucked-away corners, ready to be slaughtered onsite.

As the city of 11 million slowly gets back to life following its official reopening on April 8 – after 76 days in lockdown – old men recline on park benches, taking in the air between puffs of their cigarettes, while masked children race around, finally able to play on the bikes gifted to them for Lunar New Year. Huanan Seafood Market, however, remains firmly closed, surrounded by a 2.5-metre-tall barrier. The only sign that there was once life inside is an intense, gamy smell emanating from within, like dozens of refrigerators were switched off, their contents left to rot. Chances are, this is exactly what happened when the market was hastily shuttered for investigation on January 1.