Recycled bezoar, part 2

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shaing tai suggests this "possible clue about the mystery":

"11 Wàn yuán yī kē Angōng niúhuáng wán, guòqí 'shényào' chéng tiānjià cángpǐn hūyoule shéi”

Wèishéme guòqí de Angōng niúhuáng wán rúcǐ zǒuqiào? Shāndōng zhōng yīyào dàxué yào xuéyuàn shēngyào xì zhǔrèn Lǐ Fēng jiàoshòu fēnxī, xiànzài shìchǎng shàng zhǔyào shōugòu 1993 nián qián shēngchǎn de Angōng niúhuáng wán, qí zhǔyào yuányīn jiùshì,1989 nián wǒguó shíshī “Yěshēng dòngwù bǎohù tiáolì”, xiàndìng 1993 nián yǐhòu, yěshēng xīniújiǎo bèi mínglìng jìnzhǐ yòng yú zhìyào yuánliào, yuán yǒu de shèngyú xījiǎo yuánliào bèi fēngcún, yòng yú yánjiū děng tèshū yòngtú. Shēngchǎn chǎngjiā yúshì gǎi yòng shuǐniú jiǎo de nóngsuō fěn tìdài tā. Cǐwài, tiānrán niúhuáng, tiānrán shèxiāng yě hěn ángguì, yóuyú yuánliào xīquē, xiànzài de Angōng niúhuáng wán duō gǎi yòng réngōng shèxiāng děng tìdài pǐn.

“11万元一颗安宫牛黄丸 过期神药成天价藏品忽悠了谁”
 
为什么过期的安宫牛黄丸如此走俏?山东中医药大学药学院生药系主任李峰教授分析,现在市场上主要收购1993年前生产的安宫牛黄丸,其主要原因就是,1989年我国实施《野生动物保护条例》,限定1993年以后,野生犀牛角被明令禁止用于制药原料,原有的剩余犀角原料被封存,用于研究等特殊用途。生产厂家于是改用水牛角的浓缩粉替代它。此外,天然牛黄、天然麝香也很昂贵,由于原料稀缺,现在的安宫牛黄丸多改用人工麝香等替代品。

"110,000 yuan for one Angong Niuhuang Pill. Who has been fooled by the expired miracle drug becoming a high-priced collection?"

Why are expired Angong Niuhuang Pills so popular? Professor Li Feng, director of the Department of Pharmacognosy, School of Pharmacy, Shandong University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, analyzed that the market now mainly purchases Angong Niuhuang Pills produced before 1993. The main reason is that after 1993, China implemented the "Wildlife Protection Regulations", which stipulated that wild rhino horns were expressly prohibited from being used as pharmaceutical raw materials. The original remaining rhino horn raw materials were sealed and used for special purposes such as research. Manufacturers then replaced it with concentrated powder of buffalo horns. In addition, natural bezoar and natural musk are also very expensive. Due to the scarcity of raw materials, Angong Niuhuang Pills now mostly use substitutes such as artificial musk.

If you google on      angong niuhuan wan      you will see how costly it is, its medical applications and pharmaceutical properties, and its history.

 

Selected readings

 



4 Comments

  1. AntC said,

    December 1, 2024 @ 3:35 am

    If you google on angong niuhuan wan

    It's specifically expired Angong Niuhuang Pills. Is it that the expired pills are better for some reason? (like the formulation has changed?) or is it that 'expired' is a poor translation of what's going on? And I did come across a stock market advisory saying the bottom is falling out of the market for all such pills (but beware I believe it's machine translated; it does at least confirm we're talking about bovine gallbladder):

    'Before June this year, the price of Angong Niuhuang Pill (from Beijing Tongrentang) with a new production date could reach 600-650 yuan per pill, but in recent months, the price has dropped significantly.' …
    Currently, the price of new Zhangzhou Pientzehuang Pharmaceutical tablets is around 550 yuan per tablet, and the price of Angong Niuhuang Pill (from Beijing Tongrentang, double natural) is between 450-500 yuan per pill. The prices for expired or near-expiry drugs are even lower, with the price of near-expiry Zhangzhou Pientzehuang Pharmaceutical tablets falling to 400 yuan per tablet.
    [I have no idea whether that's still expensive NZ$100++/ US$70++ for one pill? There'll be Western medicines costing that much.]

    What I did come across when Googling was the 'recycle…' word, as we had with bezoar. Those quotes are from "recycling merchants". I can't help but feel 'recycle' is a poor translation. It means 'resellers'? 'retailers'?

    With the bezoar post, I guessed 'recycled' meant 'regurgitated'. I saw Kendra Dale's response; for me it didn't answer bks's question. Now I'm just baffled.

  2. Philip Taylor said,

    December 1, 2024 @ 6:07 am

    Is it not, Ant, simply that the expired (= "passed their use-by date") angong niuhuan wan contained real rhinoceros horn while the modern version is not permitted to by law ? Google "china-and-laos-wildlife-traffickers-exploiting-coronavirus-fears-to-peddle-illegal-wildlife-fake-cures" for more [inserting links here tends to seriously delay publication of comment].

    Incidentally, Victor's "Google on …" surprised me — I don't think I have ever encountered this phrase before — in my idiolect, one simply "Google"s something rather than "Googles on".

  3. stephen said,

    December 1, 2024 @ 4:19 pm

    I keep thinking of bizr, snack foods which are various types of seeds such as pumpkin and pistachio.

    Could there be any connection with bizarre and bazaar?
    I don't suppose, busy and business?

  4. Nico said,

    January 5, 2025 @ 2:55 am

    It's specifically expired Angong Niuhuang Pills. Is it that the expired pills are better for some reason? (like the formulation has changed?) or is it that 'expired' is a poor translation of what's going on? And I did come across a stock market advisory saying the bottom is falling out of the market for all such pills (but beware I believe it's machine translated; it does at least confirm we're talking about bovine gallbladder):

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