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“Protecting the health and informed consent rights of children since 1982.”

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BLFisher Note: But does anyone really know if monkey viruses or other adventitious agents that evade current screening technology contaminate those monkey kidney tissues and find their way into the millions of children who get those polio vaccines?

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/science/AP-EXP-Hunting-Monkeys.html?ex=1059881445&ei=1&en=095e955c749ef8c8

Scientists See Value in Barbados’ Monkeys

July 21, 2003

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

 Filed at 12:25 p.m. ET

SUGAR HILL, Barbados (AP) -- Farmers call them pests. Scientists want their kidneys. Hunters trap and shoot them, and tourists hope to see them leaping from trees or snacking on bananas.

There are 14,000 green monkeys living on this tropical Caribbean island -- one for every 20 people -- and they have become sought after for reasons ranging from a bounty on their tails to their use in polio vaccines.

Historians believe the monkeys arrived on slave ships from West Africa in the 17th century -- either as pets or as food. But today, they’re the bane of farmers whose crops they devour.

``They eat almost everything,’’ complained farmer Keith Forde, 56. ``I’ve planted banana trees for them alone.’’

A dozen or so hunters work under the government’s bounty program, which pays $7.50 for each monkey killed. But the Barbados Primate Research Center pays $25 for monkeys brought in unharmed.

The research center distributes traps, and about 1,500 live monkeys are turned in to the program each year. Sometimes the monkeys are kept alive for research. Other times, their kidneys are taken to make polio vaccines. The center sells about 800 monkeys each year to various companies and other research centers, for $1,500 each, said Jean Baulu, a Canadian primatologist and owner of the center.

As a result, he said, about 70 percent of the world’s polio vaccines come from monkeys provided by the research center.

Baulu said scientists use the monkeys’ kidney cells because they reproduce several times without mutating. That means one pair of green monkey kidneys can produce many more vaccine doses than cells from other animals.

``My idea is not to reduce the monkey population, but to keep it stable,’’ he said. ``Since 1988, polio dropped by 95 percent in the world.’’

Years ago, the research center and Barbados were blacklisted by animal-rights activists who hung posters around London, urging people to boycott the former British colony.

The campaign did little to drive away tourists -- Barbados is a popular vacation spot for Europeans -- but it hasn’t stopped animal rights activists from voicing their protest.

``There is absolutely no excuse for taking these animals from the wild and torturing them,’’ said Peter Wood of the Norfolk, Virginia-based People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

Not all the monkeys end up dead. The trappers say they often keep the babies and sell them as pets, for as much as $75 each.

Locals can also be found offering tourists a photograph with a monkey, for a small fee.

The monkeys generally grow to about 2 feet tall and live in troops of about 15. They have no natural predators on the island, but can be killed by large dogs or mongooses.

``A week never passed that we wouldn’t catch monkeys,’’ said Emerson Benskin, 33, who quit monkey-trapping after he found work on a farm.

To earn the government bounty, hunters are required to bring in 3 inches of the monkey’s tail. They usually cut the end of the tail and leave the carcass behind.

``If I only get two, I haven’t even covered my gasoline,’’ said Roger Wells, who along with a few friends roams the island monkey-hunting. He also keeps a pet monkey at home.

Wells rebuffed suggestions that hunting monkeys is cruel, saying his ``heart bleeds’’ for struggling farmers who lose money from crop damage.

``It’s the small farmers who love us,’’ he said. ``We certainly don’t want to see them (the monkeys) eradicated, and there’s certainly not much chance of that happening.’’

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