8.4: Primate Research- A Complicated History

Our Closest Relatives and a Complicated History

The fact that chimpanzees and bonobos share more than 98% of their DNA with humans has meant that for much of the twentieth century, it made them prime candidates for biomedical research. Their genetic and physiological similarity to humans made them attractive to scientists studying infectious diseases, vaccine development, and drug safety. At their peak, nearly a thousand chimpanzees were held in U.S. research facilities alone.

That era is now largely over. In 2013, the NIH announced a significant reduction in chimpanzee research, and in 2015 it went further, announcing a complete end to funding biomedical research on chimpanzees and declaring all federally owned chimpanzees eligible for retirement to sanctuary. Former NIH Director Dr. Francis Collins announced that NIH would no longer support biomedical research on chimpanzees, and a plan was developed to retire NIH-owned chimpanzees to Chimp Haven, a federal sanctuary in Keithville, Louisiana. As recently as November 2024, NIH reversed a decision to keep government-owned chimpanzees at a New Mexico laboratory for the rest of their lives, instead ordering their relocation to sanctuary (Project R & R, n.d., National Institute of Health, 2025, Block & Admundson, 2024).

The broader question of primate research is still very much in flux. Monkeys continue to be held and used for research purposes in the United States, but there is a movement both within and outside the government to make animal testing the exception rather than the rule. For students of anthropology, this history raises questions that go beyond science. If our genetic closeness to chimps, bonobos, and other primates is what made them so useful to researchers, does that same closeness carry any moral weight? It is a question the scientific community is actively grappling with, and one worth sitting with as you continue your study of our primate relatives.