Shortage of monkeys for investigations biomedicine in the US is growing, creating significant barriers for scientists. Since monkeys are usually needed to test new vaccines and treatments, the US could face serious problems if an epidemic breaks out, scientists warn. Research on a range of conditions, from infertility to Parkinson’s disease, will be delayed.
This is the conclusion of a report from the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, which notes that new ways of studying biology using artificial intelligence models cannot replace tests on monkeys. Monkeys are close relatives of humans, sharing genetics as well as brain and body biology. Neuroscientists have used African monkeys and baboons to study the brain, while pigtailed and rhesus monkeys have provided information on Covid-19 and other infectious diseases.
“Currently [οι πίθηκοι] are fundamental elements of biomedical research,” said Kenneth Ramos, researcher at the Texas A&M University system and chair of the committee that produced the report. The National Academies are an independent scientific group that advises the federal government.
A few years ago, 310 chimpanzees participating in federally funded research were retired and relocated to the reserve. More than 113,500 monkeys were kept in captivity for research purposes in the US in 2021, according to the Department of Agriculture, which oversees their handling.
Today’s crisis is the result of a “perfect storm” of events, said Paul Johnson, an HIV immunologist and director of the Emory National Research Center who was not involved in the preparation of the report. “We don’t let researchers into the center because we don’t have monkeys.”
Meanwhile, the price of monkeys for research purposes has skyrocketed, and universities are going over budget to buy the animals. Thomas Geisbert, a virologist who studies infectious diseases such as Ebola and Marburg virus at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, said that before the pandemic, a cynomolgus monkey cost about $5,000 from commercial suppliers, but now costs about $35,000.
According to the Wall Street Journal
Source: Kathimerini
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