Animal Instinct

OK. About now many of you are no doubt wondering, Who cares about pandas when as many as 50,000 people are dead and 5 million are homeless? Here's why news from the panda center matters.

First of all, it matters to the Chinese people. When news of the center's casualties and the missing pandas emerged, volunteers scrambled to buy up medicines and hospital supplies to bring to the stricken facility. When they left Wolong they transported a number of injured research personnel out of the disaster zone in their SUVs.

Meanwhile volunteer medics remain at the center, assisting injured researchers. The Chinese military is also on the scene, choppering in food and supplies. Last Monday five truckloads of bamboo were delivered to feed the 60 animals. (Eight so-called "Olympics pandas," groomed for the Games spotlight in August, were brought safely to a panda center in Chengdu earlier.)

Tuan Tuan and Yuan Yuan, moreover, are symbols of cross-straits reconciliation, giving hope to Chinese mainlanders and Taiwanese alike that decades of hostility could become a thing of the past. Many Taiwanese were captivated by the celebrity pandas and have been eagerly awaiting their arrival in Taipei.

Chinese also see the panda as a national icon-one of the five Olympic mascots is a panda-and as a symbol of Chinese efforts to protect endangered species. Only about 1,590 live in the wild, mostly in Sichuan and neighboring Shaanxi provinces; about 180 have been bred in captivity. The panda's cause has been taken up by Chinese environmentalists, who argue for a more ecologically sound mind-set in China, where blind and headlong economic growth has blighted the environment and poisoned the air in many cities.

What's important is not just that dozens of the cuddly black-and-white animals survived, but rather that ordinary Chinese citizens-not just the government-could pitch in to help them. News of the plight of the pandas and the scientists studying them are a source of hope to ordinary citizens at a time when Chinese want to be reassured that humans and nature can exist in harmony.

© 2008