Villagers help rescue sick panda in SW China

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A female panda was found curled up in a bamboo forest in Meishan, a city in China's Sichuan Province.

Rescued from Wawu Mountain on Thursday afternoon, the giant panda had suffered a rib fracture and broken paws, reported the Huaxi Metropolis Daily.

"I came to check what happened after hearing a dog continuously barking and found the panda," said Li Wanfang, the villager who first discovered the sick panda. Li only realized the panda was sick when it didn't eat the apples and bamboo offered by Li.

Out of concern of the panda’s health condition, Li and other villagers contacted staff from the Wawu Mountain Nature Reserve Forest.

The sick panda was undergoing treatment by the veterinarian. /CCTV Photo

Vets arrived and realizing that the panda had serious injuries, they tranquilized her and carried her into a room for first-aid with the help of villagers.

"...[Because she was at] an old age between 16 to 20, it was a miracle for the panda to survive," said Yang Zhi, a veterinarian, during an interview with Shanghai's Dragon Television. Yang believed the panda was infected with parasites and estimated that she hadn't eaten for days.

After receiving anti-inflammatory drugs and electrolyte water, the panda was taken to the Chengdu base for further treatment.

According to a report from the Chengdu Commercial Daily, the giant panda was still under observation on Friday night after more than 10 hours of rescue. It turned out her ribs and sternum had old fractures.

There were fewer than 2,000 pandas in the wild in China, according to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) census in 2014 , mainly in the mountains of the provinces of Sichuan, Shaanxi and Gansu.