Why We Need to Save the Medicinal Leech

Abstract

Once abundant throughout its range, the medicinal leech became endangered largely because it was so widely used by doctors for blood-letting in the 19th century. France alone imported more than a thousand million over the century. Since then demands for research purposes have greatly increased following the discovery that this leech contains a potentially very valuable anticoagulant of human blood. Protection for the species is urgently needed, says the author. One school class could unknowingly wipe out the whole of a small remnant population. © 1981, Fauna and Flora International. All rights reserved.