Beijing has removed pangolins from its official list of traditional Chinese medicine treatments, according to reports.
All eight species of the unique, scaly mammal are currently endangered and threatened with extinction.
The move - initially reported by China's Health Times newspaper - comes after Beijing raised the creature's protected status to the country's highest level last week.
Pangolin scales are extremely valuable in China as they are coveted by traditional Chinese medicine practitioners. Pangolin meat is also seen by some as a delicacy.
The animals, native to China, came to worldwide attention in January as they have been found to host strains of coronaviruses similar to Covid-19.
But although scientists are currently investigating whether trafficked pangolins may have played a role in the virus transmitting quickly from animals to humans, the evidence is unclear.
Beijing had already banned eating live wild animals - often bought from "wet markets" such as the one in Wuhan linked to the initial Covid-19 outbreak - but had until now had an exception for consuming such creatures as medicine.
Charity Save Pangolins has called the legislation a "game changer" conservation charities had been waiting for.
He told the BBC: "We hope China's next move will be to enforce the regulations and work to change consumer behaviour."
A spokesperson for animal welfare campaign group, World Animal Protection, told the news service that the protection should be extended to all wild animals, "who, like pangolins, are poached from the wild and often placed in squalid, cramped cages, creating a lethal hotbed of disease".
