The decision of New Iberia “Torture” Center, which belongs to the University of Louisiana at campus Lafayette (ULL), to transfer its 220 chimpanzees to a Sanctuary under construction in Georgia is the tip of iceberb, well hidden until recently, of the Primate Torture Industry in North American universities.

Currently, the three university Torture Centers – ULL, Texas Biomedical Research Institute and Emory University – own more than 15,000 primates. The reasons to start getting rid of  the chimpanzees is legal, not humanitarian, how they wish everyone to see. Now in the United States, torturing chimps is illegal and can incur heavy penalties if they continue doing it.

However, there are thousands of defenseless primates that are in the grip of these torturers, and that can still be exploited. Their maintenance results in million of dollars to NIH – National Institute of Health, which for decades have funded this captive population. New Iberia Research Center, University of Louisiana, apart from the 200 retired chimpanzees, now retired, alone owns and still uses in experiments 4,818 rhesus monkeys, 621 Chlorocebus monkeys, 349 crabbers monkeys, 308 macaca monkeys and 20 capuchin monkeys.

More than 10 years ago, when we visited the facilities of Anderson Institute of Cancer, in Bastrop, Texas, there were 75 chimpanzees and hundreds of rhesus monkeys caged in dark labs; they prided themselves for having a group that was born there which was the third virus-free generation – ideal for the invasive research of some aggressive virus.

The announcement of the University of Lafayette is just a smokescreen so the industry of smaller monkeys torture, financed with federal funds, is not touched. Two hundred and twenty chimpanzees will be transferred starting in June in groups of 10, but it all depends on raising money in voluntary donations to expand the Sanctuary of Georgia, a sanctuary that originally hosted gorilas and never received more than three individuals, coming from zoos, and was closed.

Thus, the announcement of the transfer of 220 chimpanzees to a Sanctuary is a way of covering up the torture of thousands of other primates, since the Sanctuary is not able to receive them and estimates at 250 million dollars the value for the entire Project – and University does not contribute to this investment.

The New Iberia Center was denounced in the past by serious ill-treatment of primates kept there, which is very bad for the image of the institution – the University of Louisiana – that should be a symbol of ethics and respect for all living beings in this world.

The animal torture industry for biomedical research in the United States at no time assumed the responsability for the future of thousands of beings who are kept under its rules and when it is decided to cease the practices, the labs just delivery the animals to society, so that, with voluntary donations, a home should be available  to receive them.

NIH – National Institute of Health, the major vilain that encourages and finances the industry, owns 308 chimpanzees and has already announced that is retiring them. However, Chimp Haven, the official Sanctuary, has no capacity to receive them and the Institute does not consider finance its expansion, leaving this task in the hands of voluntary donations, abdicating its ethical responsibility, moral and legal obligation to keep alive all the thousands of beings used and exploited for years.

Let’s not play fool with the premature announcements of retirement of primates and ceasing of the practice of torture in animals. We should demand that the torturers of the past assume the responsability for an ethical and decent future of thousands of innocent beings tortured for the sake of economic interests of many private corporations,which were their partners in these inhumane activities.

Dr. Pedro A.Ynterian

General Secretary, GAP Project International