Pangolins are the most heavily trafficked wild mammals globally, with all eight species threatened by demand for their scales and meat, creating extreme welfare suffering across their capture and transit.
Pangolin trafficking causes suffering at every stage of the chain from capture to market. Wild-caught pangolins experience the extreme stress of capture, confinement in small containers, transport over days or weeks, and holding in overcrowded conditions before sale. Their insectivorous diet cannot be replicated in transit, causing starvation alongside the chronic stress of confinement. Many die in transit; survivors face further suffering in markets. Their defensive ball-curling behavior — which protects them from wild predators — makes them entirely passive during human handling, so they experience capture without resistance while remaining fully conscious throughout. Pangolins held in traditional medicine markets are often killed on demand by methods causing prolonged suffering.