What’s a wet market? Politicians call for shutting them down in China due to COVID-19

Politicians and the country’s top infectious diseases expert said China should shut down “wet markets” during the coronavirus pandemic, media outlets reported.

Anthony Fauci, a member of the White House coronavirus task force, said on Fox News’ “Fox & Friends” that China should shut down the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan, China, which is believed to be where coronavirus originated, according to The Washington Post.

“[They] should shut down those things right away,” Fauci said, according to The Washington Post. “It just boggles my mind that how when we have so many diseases that emanate out of that unusual human-animal interface that we don’t just shut it down. I don’t know what else has to happen to get us to appreciate that. I think there are certain countries in which this is very commonplace. I would like to see the rest of the world really lean with a lot of pressure on those countries that have that, because what we’re going through right now is a direct result of that.”

Wet markets sell live and dead animals, including fish, rabbits, and bats, according to Newsweek. They’re called wet markets due to the ice used to preserve the animals and the washing of the floors of the market, the news outlet reported.

The Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market closed on Jan. 1 and trading live animals at wet markets was also banned, according to Business Insider. China also temporarily banned selling, buying and transporting animals in restaurants, markets and online, Business Insider reported.

Early coronavirus patients were connected to an animal market in China and the virus was spread from animal to person, according to The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, also spoke out about China’s wet markets, according to The Hill.

“Bringing wild and exotic animals to open markets to interact with humans and other food supplies is both crazy and dangerous,” the senator wrote, according to The Hill. “Hope my Republican and Democratic Senate colleagues will sign onto my letter to the Chinese Ambassador to the U.S. urging the immediate closure of these wet markets for the safety of the world at large.”

Representative Michael McCaul, a Republican from Texas, also said the World Health Organization should tighten regulations on China’s trade of animals, according to The Hill.