Obstacles to Financing for Retired Chimpanzees
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Version 0 of 1. As the National Institutes of Health reduces its use of chimpanzees in invasive biomedical research, it is moving more chimps to retirement homes. But the agency could face a problem in paying for their continuing support, officials say. Last week the N.I.H. announced that it would move 113 chimpanzees it owns from the New Iberia Research Center in Louisiana to Chimp Haven, the national chimpanzee sanctuary, also in Louisiana. The move was welcomed by animal welfare groups. Wayne Pacelle, president of the Humane Society of the United States, said in a statement, “This is a ray of light for captive chimpanzees.” And Linda Brent, head of Chimp Haven, said of the move, “First and foremost, it’s exciting for these chimpanzees.” The sanctuary is set in 200 acres in Keithville and is currently home to about 130 chimps that live in more natural surroundings and social conditions than those available at research institutes. The move is one consequence of an N.I.H. decision to move away from supporting biomedical research on chimpanzees. A year ago Dr. Francis S. Collins, the agency’s director, announced that it would suspend all new grants for biomedical and behavioral research on chimps that it owns or for which it is responsible. It also accepted guidelines that will allow the use of agency chimps in research only if the studies are necessary for human health, and cannot be done any other way. A further report, on how to put these guidelines into effect, is to be issued by a working group on Jan. 22. With the move of the New Iberia chimps, the total number of chimps in research facilities, some owned by universities or private companies, will be down to about 800, Mr. Pacelle said. Of those, the N.I.H. owns nearly 300. In September, the New Iberia Research Center, which has more than 200 chimps of its own, had chosen not to renew its application for money to house and maintain the N.I.H. chimps, so the agency decided to retire them, and in early December announced that the animals would be moved: between 10 and 20 to Chimp Haven and the rest to the Texas Biomedical Research Institute in San Antonio. But the Humane Society and Chimp Haven had hoped to move the chimpanzees directly to a sanctuary, and they began discussions with the agency. Chimp Haven told the N.I.H. that it could take about half of the chimps in existing facilities. With $2.3 million more in financing it could finish work on additional housing and enclosures and take all the chimps. But the N.I.H. did not have $2.3 million to contribute. Furthermore, it is nearing a cumulative cap of $30 million on support for the sanctuary, set in the law that created it. No such limit exists for support of chimps in the research population, and the result of this difference is that as research is being phased out and chimps are moving to sanctuaries, the money to support them is rapidly disappearing. The cap will probably be reached this fiscal year, according to Kathy Hudson, deputy director of science, outreach and policy at the agency. “The total dollars that we need to spend to support our chimpanzees will remain steady or perhaps even drop,” Dr. Hudson said in a conference call with reporters about the transfer of the New Iberia chimps. But since money for research chimps and money for sanctuary chimps comes from two different pots, she said, “we need a lifting of that cap.” |