Pangolin Rehabilitation and Anti-Trafficking Welfare

Pangolins are the world's most trafficked wild mammal. Rescued individuals require specialized rehabilitation before release, highlighting both trafficking welfare harms and rescue challenges.

Key Facts

All eight pangolin species are threatened by trafficking for scales and meat
Over one million pangolins are estimated to have been trafficked in the past decade
Pangolin scales are keratin -- the same material as human fingernails -- with no proven medicinal properties
Trafficked pangolins experience severe stress, dehydration, and injury during transport
Their specialized diet of ants and termites makes captive care extremely challenging
Released pangolins require GPS monitoring as they are cryptic and difficult to track by observation

Welfare Considerations

Trafficked pangolins experience acute suffering from capture, handling, and transport in densely packed shipments. Dehydration, respiratory illness, and physical injuries from rough handling cause significant mortality before animals reach their destination. Rescued pangolins face rehabilitation challenges because their insectivorous diet is difficult to replicate in captivity and they are highly stress-sensitive. Many rescued individuals die in care despite best efforts. Preventing trafficking is therefore the primary welfare intervention -- consumer demand reduction campaigns, enforcement at trafficking chokepoints, and community engagement in range states all reduce the number of individual pangolins subjected to trafficking suffering.

What You Can Do

Support organizations working on pangolin anti-trafficking enforcement and demand reduction
Never purchase pangolin scales or products derived from them
Support wildlife crime enforcement capacity building in range and consumer countries
Fund community ranger programs in pangolin habitat countries