Baby chimpanzee, name unknown, born into research at LEMSIP
Photo: © Michael Nichols. From Brutal Kinship (Aperture)

Current news

“…after careful review of existing chimpanzee resources, NCRR has determined that it does not have the financial resources to support the breeding of chimpanzees that are owned or supported by NCRR.”  Read more

Overview

For the U.S. tax payer, the cost of breeding, housing, and maintaining chimpanzees for research – apart from costs of the actual experiments – involves millions of dollars per year.

Maintaining chimpanzees is an expensive proposition. According to Project R&R’s investigation, 30-50% of the total annual cost of federally funded chimpanzee research is for their maintenance. These costs are often buried in grants and when tallied comprise a significant amount of total funding.

The breeding and maintenance of chimpanzees has become an end in itself. Private and government careers are sustained by it; revenue is steadily generated from it; and, scientists build careers by studying it.

Annie Chimpanzee was intended to be used as a “breeder” at LEMSIP
Photo: © Fauna Foundation

The infrastructure created to support the use of chimpanzees in research is a self-sustaining “business” fueled by public dollars and sacrificed chimpanzee lives.

A moratorium on the breeding of federally supported chimpanzees was declared in 1995. However, the following summary shows that a number of NIH-approved grants have focused on or included breeding as a goal. Such funded protocols have effectively allowed facilities to circumvent the breeding moratorium.

Uncovering the real costs

Examining projects funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to maintain chimpanzees for research is one route to gauge the costs of breeding and maintenance.

For example, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) maintains a contract with the New Iberia Research Center to provide NIAID with approximately 10 to 12 infant chimpanzees annually for a variety of research projects. The 10-year contract entitled “Leasing of chimpanzees for the conduct of research” has been allotted over $22 million for the entire project, with nearly $4 million spent since its inception in September 2002. (1) 

For the year 2000, the following grants were awarded to the New Iberia Primate Center (NIRC) at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, and to the Yerkes National Primate Research Center in Atlanta (Yerkes). (NIRC contains the largest single holding of nonhuman primates in the U.S with approximately 4,650 monkeys and 350 chimpanzees.)

Grant 1 - $335,000

In 2000, NIRC received Grant 3U42RR003583-14S1: “Establishment of a Chimpanzee Breeding/Research Program.” Funded at $335,000, the abstract explains:

The National institutes of Health established five centers, managed by the NCRR national chimpanzee breeding and research program (CBRP), to perpetuate the chimpanzee population in the U.S. and to insure the stable supply of chimpanzees for this essential research. As one of the five centers selected to participate in the CBRP, the U.S.L. – New Iberia Research Center (NIRC) has established a productive chimpanzee breeder colony, now consisting of 128 animals. NIRC has 292 chimpanzees on sites and the facility houses a total population of 4500 non-human primates. The long term objective of NIRC is the [sic] support the goals established for chimpanzees by the NIH/NCRR in regard to perpetuation of the chimpanzee population in the U.S. by maintenance of a healthy breeding population and to insure the stable supply of this valuable resource for essential biomedical and behavioral research….

Grant 2 - $820,281

In addition to the 2000 grant of $335,000, NIRC also received $820,281 in federal funding for another project: “Establishment/Maintenance of Biomedical Research Colony.” [1U42RR015087-01]. The abstract clarifies that the funding was for the breeding and maintenance of chimpanzees and not the facility’s other 4,500 animals:

The biomedical and behavioral research community has long recognized the importance of chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) as an animal model…. Specifically, USL-NIRC will maintain capabilities to successfully breed and house chimpanzees in an Association for Assessment and Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care (AAALAC) International accredited colony and to insure gene pool diversity through parentage testing. …The program proposed will meet the research and testing needs for chimpanzees by offering suitable CBRP [Chimpanzee Breeding and Research Program] progeny to investigators for use in approved experimental protocols. [Grant 1U42RR015087-01].

Thus, the cost to the public in 2000 for maintaining a colony of chimpanzees at NIRC was closer to $1.15 million.

Grant 3 - Amount unavailable

The 2000 NIRC project “Slow, Latent and Temperate Virus Infections,” received NIH funding to conduct research into Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathies (TSEs). [Grant 3N01NS092302-003] In reviewing the abstract it appears that the funding is allotted to provide a bank of nonhuman primates (including chimpanzees) as a supply for potentially infected nervous tissue (though human tissue is available). How directly the money was used for actual protocols is unclear:

The contractor [NIRC] provides care, housing, and research support for nonhuman primates assigned to the Laboratory of Central Nervous System Studies, NINDS [National Institute of Nervous Disorders and Stroke], in their effort to accomplish these goals [control progression of TSEs]. The contractor is responsible for monitoring nonhuman primates that have been, or will be, inoculated via various routes, with tissues known, or suspected to be, infected with one of the TSE agents, recording findings, and performing appropriate procedures to provide the Project Officer with animal samples for evaluation.

A portion of this contract was allotted to fund the costs of maintaining nonhuman primates for research. The full amount of the contract (unavailable due to incomplete data) was not allotted solely for chimpanzees but for a mixed population of nonhuman primates. Information received by Project R&R in October 2003 through the Freedom of Information Act indicates that there were 57 chimpanzees used for the TSE research at New Iberia. Thus, the estimated $1.15 million to sustain chimpanzees at NIRC is an indeterminable amount higher.

Grant 4 - $327,750

In addition to grants allotted for the physical maintenance of chimpanzees, grants to breed them are numerous. For example, the 2000 NIH grant 5R01RR005994-09 “Reproductive parameters of the chimpanzee model,” represents $327,750 in funding to Kenneth Gould at Yerkes. The abstract states that the research is designed “to study the molecular basis of post-testicular sperm maturation in the chimpanzee,” research likely intended to better manipulate chimpanzee breeding.

These studies are essential in understanding primate reproductive function, and may contribute to the development of contraceptive strategies based on interfering with post-testicular sperm maturation. This would permit fertility control in the captive chimpanzee population while not compromising social interactions and the potential use of the chimpanzee population for biomedical research. [Grant 5R01RR005994-09].

Other Year 2000 grants …

Yerkes received an additional $6.18 million in 2000 to conduct various studies of which at least five were focused on chimpanzee breeding or genetic management.

Manipulation of reproduction has been a core component of primate research for decades. In 1974, Frederick Wiseman’s film PRIMATE exposed the ludicrous breeding research (among other things) that was taking place at the Yerkes Primate Research Center. (2) (The film is available for viewing at NEAVS sponsored events.)

The Coulston Foundation (now closed) received two grants in 2000 for a total of $1.2 million, “Establishment of a Breeding and Research Program”:

The Coulston Foundation proposes to continue a self-sustaining chimpanzee breeding colony of animals which will produce 10-15 animals per year. Approximately 50% will he [sic] retained each year to serve as eventual breeders. The remaining infants will he [sic] provided to research programs of national importance. …. Two populations will be maintained, formed from a genetic strategy provided, designating animals to either research and breeding pools, thus creating a purpose bred chimpanzee.

The genetic management of chimpanzees was a clear objective in NIH’s 1997 report which stated “… research-oriented genetic management must balance the goals of preserving the long-term viability of the population with those of specific research needs… The finite size of the U.S. research chimpanzee population indicates that inbreeding is inevitable if chimpanzee breeding is to be continued in perpetuity. That implies that genetic-management techniques should be used to avoid inbreeding and maintain genetic variability.” (3)

Both Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research (SWFBR) and University of Texas/M.D. Anderson Cancer Center (MDACC), house large numbers of chimpanzees (230 and 141 respectively). They were awarded grants for maintenance costs and breeding programs in 2000 alone for a combined total of $3.2 million.

Maintenance and Breeding Grant Awards at SWFBR and MDACC in 2000 (Table 1)

In summary, Project R&R determined that in 2000 a total of $6.4 million was granted to 18 projects devoted primarily to the housing, maintenance, and breeding of chimpanzees. Accurate figures are difficult to arrive at since some of these awards included a mixed population of chimpanzees and other nonhuman primates. The data available for NIH funding is incomplete. The estimates are likely conservative.

These figures represent an average one-third to one-half the total cost of federally funded chimpanzee research paid for by public tax dollars.

Last update 01/04/06

Sources

(1) http://dcis.hhs.gov/nih/nih_daily_active_web.html (See contract No. 272022754) 

(2) PRIMATE, directed by Frederick Wiseman, 1974, Zipporah Films, Inc. is available on loan from NEAVS. Due to the purchase contract, showings are subject to specific conditions, including that it be shown in its entirety (113 minutes) at NEAVS-sponsored events. Contact NEAVS for further information.

(3) National Resource Council, Institute for Laboratory Animal Research, “Chimpanzees in Research: strategies for their ethical care, management, and use.” Chapter 4, National Academy Press. 1997

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