The COVID-19 pandemic provoked public attention to medical treatments across the world. In China, a debate on the efficacy of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) took place amid the government's active promotion of it for COVID-19 patients. Rather than addressing such a debate from the perspective of medical science or health communication, this paper explores how TCM was politicised on Chinese social media. The research is based on a case study, collecting data from the most popular Chinese community question-answering (CQA) site -Zhihu. By triangulating content analysis (CA) and thematic analysis (TA), we reveal how nationalist sentiments and dissenting opinions are expressed through approval or criticism of TCM among the Zhihu community. The research findings uncover the political momentum behind the debate by shedding light on how Zhihu users engage with public affairs through medical commentaries. This paper thus contributes to understanding the politicised discourse of TCM in China in the wake of the global pandemic.

Agricultural plastic waste from nonpackaging polymers, such as those used in silage production, constitutes the majority of the UK's agricultural plastic waste due to inadequate management. This study included online and telephone interviews with 12 British dairy farmers (nine from England, three from Wales) to understand the use of non‐packaging plastic in silage production on British dairy farms. It examined their current silage production techniques and agricultural plastic waste management behaviours and highlighted the challenges of reducing plastic waste on dairy farms through the lens of circular economy. The findings show that UK dairy farmers have adhered to the mantra of reduce, reuse and recycle. They use silage clamps for high volumes of silage production, try to reuse some used silage sheets and express a strong interest in having their waste plastic collected and recycled. However, the lack of effective agricultural plastic waste collection services, inequitable enforcement of plastic waste management regulations and rising costs of waste plastic collection in the UK make it difficult for them to recycle effectively. © 2022 The Author. Polymer International published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of Society of Industrial Chemistry.

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