Happy New Year, Alamogordo Chimpanzees

Two hundred and some chimpanzees—previously used in experiments and kept in tiny cells, alone, isolated, and with nothing but a cement slab to sleep on and nothing to see or do, but who have been undergoing rehabilitation and socialization with each other—have been spared from their imminent transfer back into NIH laboratories. These chimpanzees, whom PETA president Ingrid E. Newkirk wrote about on The Huffington Post in 2010, had been about to be shipped out, but the National Institutes of Health has just announced—no doubt because of New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson’s protests and those of many members of Congress and groups like PETA—that the chimpanzees will not be moved, at least until a study has been conducted, which will take two years.

Fourteen of the chimpanzees were not that lucky and have already been shipped out. Please join us in asking that they not be used and that all the chimpanzees be allowed to go to a sanctuary early in 2011. Meanwhile, pop a cork for our friends at Alamogordo, who have just scraped by under the wire! Thanks to all of you who wrote and called and helped to make this a happier New Year’s Eve for these animals.