January 17, 2022 - WASHINGTON – Sens. John Kennedy (R-La.) and Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) have introduced the Bear Poaching Elimination Act, which would help protect bears from poaching by ending the trade of their internal organs.

“Poaching bears to harvest their organs is cruel, and it’s destroying bear populations. The Bear Poaching Elimination Act would help keep these animals safe by making it harder for animal abusers to profit from their brutality,” said Kennedy.

“The gruesome bear viscera commercial trade leads to unacceptable abuse of these bears, and I’m proud to join Senator Kennedy to introduce this bipartisan bill that would help put an end to this inhumane practice in the United States and help slow bear poaching and the decline of bear populations,” said Duckworth.

In Asia, thousands of bears suffer in small cages so abusers can extract their bile for use in cosmetics and medicine. In the U.S., poachers kill American bears to harvest their viscera. The trade in bear gallbladders has contributed to drastically reducing Asian bear populations, and now American bears are increasingly in danger.

The Bear Poaching Elimination Act would prevent the import, export, possession, transportation and trading of bear viscera.

Text of the Bear Poaching Elimination Act is available here.
Source: Senator John Kennedy