Controversial: The dog meat festival in Yulin, China, often attracts protests from animal rights activists Protests: The Human Society International released this image of a dog waiting to be sold for meat in a market in Yulin in 2013

The public uproar reflects the increasing affluence of ordinary Chinese, who keep pets, travel overseas and are changing attitudes toward traditions they may not have questioned before.

Photos on state media showed groups of Yulin city residents tucking into plates of meat and vegetables around dining tables strewn with lychees. Other photos, which circulated widely on Chinese microblogs, were of skinned, cooked dogs hanging from hooks at street stalls or piled on tables.

Under the Yulin tradition, eating dog and lychee and drinking liquor on the solstice is supposed to make people stay healthy during winter. It is unclear if the supposed health benefits diminish if the feast occurs before the actual solstice.

Stop the killing. Charity trying to end Chinese dog-meat festival

Celebration: The dogs are killed and sold as part of the summer solstice, which takes place this Saturday

Grisly end: There are reports that local Chinese residents began their celebrations early to avoid protests

Unpopular: The Yulin government has sought to distance itself from the feasting, saying it is not officially endorsed

Animal rights activists say the event is a public health risk because the dogs undergo no quarantine to ensure they are free of disease, and that they are strays grabbed off streets around the country, as well as allegedly stolen from pet owners. The dogs are often poisoned with toxic chemicals that could be harmful to humans, they say.

Deng Yidan, an activist with Animals Asia, said the public backlash hurts the image of Yulin and China.

'Negative coverage is growing — dog theft, criminal activities, food hygiene issues, and rabies fears — not to mention the division in society between those for and against the festival — together these have brought significantly more negative publicity to Yulin than economic benefits,' Deng said in a statement.

Unhygienic?: Animal rights activists say the event is a public health risk because the dogs undergo no quarantine to ensure they are free of disease

Criminal reports: Activists claim that the dogs killed are strays grabbed off streets around the country - and some are allegedly stolen from pet owners

Bitter end: A dog waits to be sold for its meat in a market in Yulin

The Yulin government has sought to distance itself from the feasting, saying it is not officially endorsed. State media reports say the government told restaurants to remove references to dog meat from their menus and signboards — though it did not ban the sale and consumption of the meat, which is not illegal in China.

The government has denied the formal existence of such a festival, saying it is a culinary habit practiced only by some businesses and people.

Public pressure stopped another dog meat festival, in eastern Zhejiang province, which was cancelled in 2011 despite dating back hundreds of years.

this is the whole reason why i dont eat meat, theres alot of people going on about how sad it is but tuck into a chicken dinner its the same thing, just because your lead to believe all animals all killed humanely for food and you see these poor dogs in cages waiting for there fate in china, alot of them are not, and thats in england , poverty has been reduced in china by a hell of alot which i believe is the reason why they eat everything, cant really blame them for sticking to what they know and i really wish this didn't happen, but this is how it is for cows chickens lambs etc etc in england (although not all farms) people torturing animals because in there words, are being killed anyway

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/article-2661107/China-dog-eaters-dodge-activists-early-feast.html#ixzz35ATZQuRf
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook