Misinformation about giant pandas on loan from China being abused at American zoos has spread as ties deteriorate between Beijing and Washington. One such video viewed over a million times misuses footage of bears undergoing unrelated medical procedures at institutions in Singapore and Canada, alongside the false claim they show a panda in the United States named Mei Xiang being electrocuted.

"This is authentic footage of panda Mei Xiang being abused in the United States," says a narrator of a video uploaded to Chinese short-video-sharing platform Kuaishou on March 25, 2023.

A caption with the video says the animal was "electroshocked and artificially inseminated 24 times, and forced to give birth at 22 years old", which is considered elderly.

The accompanying thumbnail of the video -- viewed more than 1.6 million times -- shows medical staff surrounding a panda on a stretcher. Simplified Chinese text superimposed on the thumbnail makes the same claim.

Another series of clips featured repeatedly in the Kuaishou video shows a panda in an operating room, also surrounded by staff.

Mei Xiang, an ageing female, is one of three pandas living in the United States' National Zoo in Washington, on loan from China (archived link). They will be repatriated by the end of 2023 after more than two decades in the capital city (archived link).

But political tension between Beijing and Washington has clouded the bears' long-planned return, with misleading or false claims that pandas have...

Read Full Story: https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiLWh0dHBzOi8vZmFjdGNoZWNrLmFmcC5jb20v...