Heparin is used for patients after surgery or those who struggle with circulatory diseases. Substance contained in the mucous membranes of the intestines of domestic pigs. Numerous efforts to develop synthetic analogues were in vain, and the industrial production of heparin depends on raw materials derived from mammalian tissue. For several decades, global demand for heparin is growing, and it is made of tons of animal materials.

While China is the world's largest pork producer and has access to a huge amount of raw materials needed for the production of drugs with the heparin. However, the growing epidemic of ASF, mows a livestock of pigs, threatens to change this situation. This can have serious consequences for the global supply of heparin.

In 2008, the epidemic of the virus reproductive and respiratory syndrome swine (PRRS) in Chinese swine herds was the cause of the sudden unavailability of the drug. The consequence was numerous of its rigging, which led to 80 deaths and hundreds of side effects among patients who use the drug. The virus of the African plague of pigs has a much greater destructive potential than the rrss, and it can lead to much bigger losses among pigs in China.

The possible lack of preparations from porcine heparin will threaten the lives of thousands of patients. One of the ideas that can help solve the problem with the supply of heparin, the use of the mucous membranes of the intestines of the cattle. Heparin from cattle not identical tissues obtained from pigs, and the compositions of the preparations based on it have to be heavily modified. For many years they are successfully used in Brazil, Argentina and India. Achs and the need for new raw materials for medicines can be a huge chance for countries with large livestock of cattle.