America has a shortage of lab monkeys

AMERICAN AUTHORITIES arrested Masphal Kry, an official in Cambodia’s forestry administration, last November when he was heading to an international meeting about trade regulations for endangered species in Panama. Prosecutors accused him of conspiring with a smuggling ring. The contraband: monkeys, specifically long-tailed macaques. His gang allegedly grabbed wild macaques in Cambodia’s national parks and bribed officials to label them as captive-bred. Fake papers allowed Vanny Bio Research, a Cambodian pharma company, to ship these unfortunate primates to America for use in research. Mr Kry is facing trial in Florida’s Southern District Court.

The federal government funds seven National Primate Research Centres (NPRCs), which house in total around 20,000 primates, macaques but also baboons and marmosets. These centres then award primates to labs across America. NPRCs have fulfilled only a third of requests for untested-on macaques in 2021 and prices have soared. Before the covid-19 pandemic a rhesus macaque cost $8,000; by 2022 they had hit $24,000. Another species, long-tailed macaques, is probably per pound currently the most expensive traded wildlife, says Lisa Jones-Engel, a science adviser at PETA, an animal-rights group.