The case of long-tailed macaques
More than 200,000 non-human primates are “used” annually in laboratories around the world, a terrifying number that continues to rise. The vast majority are long-tailed macaques (Macaca fascicularis)small and very intelligent primates that only a few years ago were abundant in nature, but which, currently, are found in danger of extinctionboth due to the massive deforestation of their habitats and their constant capture and illegal trafficking to supply the animal testing business. Againvery recently, the IUCN has ratified the listing of long-tailed macaques as an endangered species. In cases like Cambodia, the population of long-tailed macaques has decreased by 97.5% in the last thirteen years.
In recent years, and thanks to European and American financing, the Republic of Mauritius and several Southeast Asian countries have turned the suffering of these animals into a lucrative business. There are huge “long-tailed macaque farms” that are supplied to animal experimentation centers around the world.
The negligence of the authorities and the catastrophic consequences for public health
Long-tailed macaques can be carriers of serious diseases transmissible to humans: Ebola, tuberculosis, herpes b, melioidosis, measles… Even so, farms in the countries of origin continue to capture them in their habitat and overcrowd them in deplorable and unhealthy conditions, until they are sent to be slaughtered in laboratories.
During these transports, which can last days, the macaques are locked in tiny wooden boxes and sent around the world in the hold of an airplane (usually from SkyTaxi or SmartLynx airlines), making stops at various airports and being managed by workers without any type of protection.
These very poor conditions and the negligence committed by the authorities have caused dangerous situations for public health:
- In January 2022, a truck loaded with 100 macaques long-tail boat from Mauritius overturned on a US highway. Various macaques they managed to escape and one of them spat on a woman, who ended up presenting symptoms such as conjunctivitis and cough. Finally, the macaques that had escaped were shot to death, and the rest were sent to a laboratory, where they would have been tortured and slaughtered.
- Between 2022 and 2023, hundreds of macaques that had tested negative in several tuberculosis tests were transported from Vietnam to the RC Hartelust experimental animal distribution center in the Netherlands. After passing the quarantine and once again testing negative in all the tests, the macaques were “separated into batches” and transported by road to several countries in the European Union. In Spain, 114 macaques were sent to Anapath Research (Barcelona); 18, to the Comprehensive Neuroscience Center (Madrid); and 8, to Vivotecnia (Madrid). After having “used” and killed the macaques, several of the centers discovered that many of them were infected with tuberculosis. At Anapath Research, in addition to confirming the outbreak and killing the 114 macaques, they also discovered that one of the workers had been infected with tuberculosis, exposing the local population to enormous danger. Just a few months later, another 540 macaques also infected with tuberculosis They were sent from Vietnam to laboratories in the United States.
- The year 2024, a Madrid animal experimentation center was scammed when trying to buy 14 macaques in Indonesia for 542,000 euros. In addition to the murky and aberrant news, in Indonesia long-tailed macaques continue to be brutally hunted, and it has been shown that they carry diseases such as rabies, malaria or herpes b; the latter, an infection that has practically no symptoms in macaques, but that in humans has high mortality and causes paralysis and neurological damage.
- Recently, the organization People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has published an extensive report documenting cases of tuberculosis in macaques long-tail in laboratories in the United States, all of them detected after having stopped in a European country. According to the WHO, tuberculosis is the world’s deadliest infectious disease, affecting about 11 million people annually and causing more than one million deaths. Despite this serious risk, animal experimentation continues to contribute to the spread of this deadly disease. Between 2021 and 2024 alone, US authorities recorded 85 tuberculosis outbreaks in macaques imported from Mauritius, Vietnam, Cambodia and the Philippines, destined for laboratories. Of them, 20% of cases were not detected until after the “quarantine”.
The largest distribution and experimentation center for primates in Europe, Camarney SL: a catastrophe announced and documented
Camarney SL (in Camarles, Tarragona) is the largest distribution center for primates in Europe and currently belongs to Charles River Laboratories, the largest animal experimentation company in the world. To date, Camarney is already responsible for the torture and massacre of more than 40,000 long-tailed macaques, all of them from the Republic of Mauritius and Vietnam.
In both countries it has been documented how long-tailed macaques continue to be hunted to supply farms, and the many diseases they carry. Despite this, both the Generalitat of Catalonia and the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food-MAPA and the Ministry for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge-MITECO, continue to allow Camarney to import thousands of macaques each year and then kill them in experiments. A cruel, devastating and dangerous business:
- This sad image shows a Camarney worker, without any type of security measures, doing a selfie with one of the poor Camarney macaques. In addition to being unbearably cruel, this photo also represents extremely serious irresponsibility, which could have caused a pandemic.
- In January this year, 199 macaques were transported from the island of Mauritius to Paris and then sent by road to Camarney. Upon landing at Charles de Gaulle airport, they realized that two of the macaques were dead and, although they did not know the cause of the deaths, or whether they were carrying diseases transmissible to humans, they put them in vans with the other 197 macaques and transported them to Camarney SL for a further 24 hours. Despite the seriousness of the situation, the Generalitat of Catalonia did not supervise or verify the autopsies carried out by Camarney, which ruled the deaths as heart attacks of unknown cause.
- On November 7, 2023, a plane loaded with 380 long-tailed macaques from Mauritius landed at the Josep Tarradellas Barcelona-El Prat airport. Despite the enormous risk of disease spread and infection, they were handled by workers without any protection, and 96 of them remained for another two days in a cargo warehouse until they were transported to laboratories in the United Kingdom. The rest were sent to Camarney SL.
- In 2024, Labcorp, one of the German laboratories that frequently imports Camarney macaques, published several articles on how a new type of hepatitis A discovered in macaques was invalidating the results of the experiments. As we have been able to confirm from several reliable sources, this new type of hepatitis A, transmissible to humans, comes from Camarney.
- Although the law requires an annual inspection of all centers that use and distribute primates for experimentation, the Generalitat of Catalonia did not carry out any inspection of Camarney in 2022 (nor in 2006, 2007, 2012 or 2015). That same year, Camarney murdered 143 macaques with enteritisa serious diarrhea that can be a symptom of other dangerous diseases for humans. Despite this, the Generalitat of Catalonia did not investigate the cause.
- The cages where the macaques are kept in Camarney are located outdoors and are only separated from the wildlife and local population by a rusty and deteriorated wire fence, allowing hares, birds, mice and even cats to frequently come into contact with the macaques and spread any diseases they carry. As if all this were not enough, in the area where Camarney is located there is a very high population of the most lethal animal for humans, the mosquito, meaning that for the inhabitants of the area a simple bite can become fatal.
Since the lobbies and animal experimentation companies will continue to try to make people believe that their atrocities are the only way to find cures for diseases or develop medicines; but, meanwhile, every day, they continue to endanger us with their cruel business. Both because of the uselessness of a huge percentage of their results, and because of the danger to public health to which they continually expose us.
