Xiaoming, older than 20 years (equal to human aged 60), was the second giant panda to receive the cataract surgery in China. China conducted the world's first cataract surgery on a panda in 2002 in east China's Fuzhou City.
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Xiaoming, a male wild panda, was eating an apple on February 20, 2009. He received the cataract surgery on Dec. 20 last year.
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Xiaoming is a male wild panda discovered by farmers in the mountains in Taibai County, Shaanxi, in March, 2007. He was weak and blind when he was found and was sent to the center rehabilitation.
Veterinarians discovered that the panda was completely blind in his right eye and had a cataract on the left eye.
Ma Qingyi, director of the center, said pandas are near-sighted animals. Forty- to -sixty percent of wild pandas suffer from cataracts and other eye diseases.
Giant pandas are among the world's most endangered animals. There are about 1,590 pandas living in China's wild, mostly in Sichuan and the northwestern provinces of Shaanxi and Gansu. As of 2007, there were 239 captive bred giant pandas in the country.
(Xinhua News Agency February 27, 2009)
