Sunday Times - Times-Live.
Wild baboons kept in 'horrifying' labs
Aug 8, 2010 12:00 AM | By ANTON FERREIRA
Medical researchers in South Africa are benefiting from a cheap supply of live subjects on which to experiment - baboons trapped in the wild after wreaking havoc on farms.
At least two universities - the University of Cape Town and North West University - use wild-caught baboons for research, a practice now banned in Europe and Australia due to animal welfare concerns.
Primate experts say that to confine a "born free" primate in a cage is unnecessarily cruel, and that it is preferable to use animals bred in captivity.
However, it is far more expensive to breed primates in captivity than to catch them in the wild.
Now UCT staff and researchers are locked in fierce debate over whether to continue experimenting on wild-caught animals, and will hold a meeting on the issue later this month.
"It's a political hot potato at the moment," said one UCT scientist who did not want to be named. "I don't want to stop animal experimentation; I want to make sure it happens under the best international practice, and that includes not using wild-caught animals."
A US primatologist now based in Cape Town, Tim Newman, said there were valid arguments for using primates in medical research, depending what tests were done, how the animals were treated and what happened to them afterwards.
"Imagine a wild primate - they have a stress response very much like our own. They don't understand what's happening to them, they're almost in a perpetual state of fear ...
"If one must use primates in research, then I would think there's a big difference, morally and ethically, between using a captive-bred animal rather than a wild-caught animal."
Newman said research animals in South Africa were generally kept in small cages with only artificial lighting, "conditions that would horrify most of us".
"These are social animals and, particularly if they're wild-caught, it's got to be a horrible experience for them."
Peter Lloyd, a senior scientist at Cape Nature, said farmers who wanted to sell baboons to researchers had to prove the animals were a threat to their crops, and that they had implemented measures like electric fencing to try to solve the problem.
"We can't forbid it, but we can manage it by making it as difficult as possible," he said.
Lloyd said Western Cape authorities had received only one application in the last five years from a farmer wanting to trap baboons and sell them.
The price for a wild-caught baboon is anywhere between R7500 and R15000, according to Este Kotze, an inspector with the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals who serves on a national ethics committee overseeing the use of animals in research.
"We oppose the use of non-human primates, but we have to accept that some research continues," Kotze said.
"We make recommendations on alternatives."
Louis Jacobs, a spokesman for North West University, said the university had last used baboons for medical research four years ago.
"Sixteen baboons, categorised as problem animals, were caught with the assistance of and permits from nature conservation, at a holiday resort in Rustenburg," he said. "Upon completion of the research, the animals were humanely put down."
Jacobs said all research on animals at the university had to be approved by the ethics committee on which the SPCA served.
Most medical research on baboons involves testing medicines, including potential Aids treatments, and surgical procedures. Lloyd said "huge" numbers of baboons were taken from the wild in the 1970s for use in heart transplant research.
"It's still not a perfect system; but we're in the middle and we have to address issues from both sides."
Toni Brokhoven, a spokesman for the animal rights group Beauty Without Cruelty, condemned all research on live animals.
"Whether they're wild-caught or captive-bred, the point is that they're still wild animals," she said. "Two or three generations down the line does not make them happy to be worked on, and does not make them any less uncomfortable being in cages."
Paragraph.
BABOON KILLED BY AUTHORITIES.
Having spent many years observing baboons in every possible environment in SA, I can only be saddened at the power that propaganda has on the public's attitudes towards baboons. It is entirely removed from what I understand to be the truth and reality of baboon life. Karin Saks.
"Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude...See more of a community toward some cause or position. As opposed to impartially providing information, propaganda in its most basic sense, presents information primarily to influence an audience. Propaganda often presents facts selectively (thus possibly lying by omission) to encourage a particular synthesis, or uses loaded messages to produce an emotional rather than rational response to the information presented. The desired result is a change of the attitude toward the subject in the target audience to further a political agenda. Propaganda can be used as a form of political warfare."
William the baboon - Trapped and Killed
John Yeld
CAPE ARGUS.
7 July 2010
William, the lovable rogue or the scourge of Scarborough - depending on your point of view - is dead, courtesy of a new protocol for managing raiding baboons on the Peninsula.
The big male baboon, estimated to have been about 14 years old and known officially as GOB03, was put down by a City of Cape Town vet after being caught in a trap on Friday.
His death has greatly upset some baboon conservationists, who say this decision was taken without adequate input from civil society, and that not enough was being done to educate and persuade residents in areas subject to baboon raids to take adequate measures to protect their properties.
But the city has justified the decision, saying it was a necessary step "taken after thorough investigation and careful consideration in the interest of human health and safety, and the improved management and conservation of baboons on the Peninsula".
The chairman of the Scarborough Residents Association, Richard Gebhardt, has confirmed that William was a severe problem in the village.
"I'm really sorry to hear that (the baboon was euthanased) and I had always hoped that it would never happen, but William was a big problem," Gebhardt said on Tuesday.
"Much as I hate saying so, William was the main trainer for all the young juvenile delinquents running around. They would rip out windows, take doors off hinges and come in through the cat flaps... William raided at will with total impunity and without fear, and I say that from personal experience in my house."
Jenni Trethowan, of the conservation group Baboon Matters, said she had struggled to get confirmation of the incident from the authorities after hearing about it informally on Monday. "Everyone was being very shtum about it. CapeNature told me they knew he had been captured, but I was fobbed off as to the how and why," she said.
She believed William was about 14 years old and had first encountered him as a juvenile in 2001 when he had been part of the Da Gama Park troop headed by alpha male George.
"He was just a young boy then and I've been watching him grow up. What has he been condemned for? What was his big crime?"
Trethowan said she wanted to know what decision-making process had led to the decision to put down William.
"It certainly didn't involve any interested and affected parties - I phoned everyone I knew, and nobody knew anything."
She also asked what programmes were in place to ensure that residents of areas where baboons raided were taking appropriate preventative measures.
"They're just acting against the baboons and this is all very one-sided," she said.
City spokesperson Kylie Hatton said in response that the city, CapeNature and Table Mountain National Park were jointly responsible for managing "this difficult, historic situation". GOB03 was found to be raiding on a regular basis, entering houses when he knew there were people inside and sometimes actively breaking windows or doors.
"Perhaps most worryingly, such raiding behaviour was often done in the company of juvenile baboons and thus future generations of baboons might have been learning that part of foraging involved breaking, entering and chasing people in their homes."
After a review of all the information, permission had been given to catch and put down the animal with a lethal injection, she confirmed.
"Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude...
William the baboon - Trapped and Killed
John Yeld
CAPE ARGUS.
7 July 2010
William, the lovable rogue or the scourge of Scarborough - depending on your point of view - is dead, courtesy of a new protocol for managing raiding baboons on the Peninsula.
The big male baboon, estimated to have been about 14 years old and known officially as GOB03, was put down by a City of Cape Town vet after being caught in a trap on Friday.
His death has greatly upset some baboon conservationists, who say this decision was taken without adequate input from civil society, and that not enough was being done to educate and persuade residents in areas subject to baboon raids to take adequate measures to protect their properties.
But the city has justified the decision, saying it was a necessary step "taken after thorough investigation and careful consideration in the interest of human health and safety, and the improved management and conservation of baboons on the Peninsula".
The chairman of the Scarborough Residents Association, Richard Gebhardt, has confirmed that William was a severe problem in the village.
"I'm really sorry to hear that (the baboon was euthanased) and I had always hoped that it would never happen, but William was a big problem," Gebhardt said on Tuesday.
"Much as I hate saying so, William was the main trainer for all the young juvenile delinquents running around. They would rip out windows, take doors off hinges and come in through the cat flaps... William raided at will with total impunity and without fear, and I say that from personal experience in my house."
Jenni Trethowan, of the conservation group Baboon Matters, said she had struggled to get confirmation of the incident from the authorities after hearing about it informally on Monday. "Everyone was being very shtum about it. CapeNature told me they knew he had been captured, but I was fobbed off as to the how and why," she said.
She believed William was about 14 years old and had first encountered him as a juvenile in 2001 when he had been part of the Da Gama Park troop headed by alpha male George.
"He was just a young boy then and I've been watching him grow up. What has he been condemned for? What was his big crime?"
Trethowan said she wanted to know what decision-making process had led to the decision to put down William.
"It certainly didn't involve any interested and affected parties - I phoned everyone I knew, and nobody knew anything."
She also asked what programmes were in place to ensure that residents of areas where baboons raided were taking appropriate preventative measures.
"They're just acting against the baboons and this is all very one-sided," she said.
City spokesperson Kylie Hatton said in response that the city, CapeNature and Table Mountain National Park were jointly responsible for managing "this difficult, historic situation". GOB03 was found to be raiding on a regular basis, entering houses when he knew there were people inside and sometimes actively breaking windows or doors.
"Perhaps most worryingly, such raiding behaviour was often done in the company of juvenile baboons and thus future generations of baboons might have been learning that part of foraging involved breaking, entering and chasing people in their homes."
After a review of all the information, permission had been given to catch and put down the animal with a lethal injection, she confirmed.