Some Lawrenceville Residents Want Yerkes Primate Center Closed

In response to the June 23 announcement of the —who is still at large—from Emory University's Yerkes National Primate Research Center Field Station in Lawrenceville, 18 local residents have filed an official nuisance complaint with the Lawrenceville Planning, Zoning, and Inspections Department calling for the laboratory to be shut down. They cite Yerkes' potentially deadly decision to wait a week after the escape to alert the community, its appalling track record of federal safety and animal welfare violations, and the serious health and safety risks posed by primates escaping from the testing facility into the adjacent residential neighborhood, which includes a park, playground, and school areas. "Not only is Yerkes causing thousands of primates to suffer inside its laboratories, it is exposing the people of Lawrenceville to serious health and safety risks—and it even went so far as to try to keep the recent escape a secret," says PETA Vice President of Laboratory Investigations Kathy Guillermo. "A dreadful facility like Yerkes has no place in modern society, especially right in the middle of a densely populated community." Macaques, chimpanzees, and other primates at the Yerkes Field Station can cause grave physical injuries to humans and harbor many serious viruses and diseases that are transmissible to humans, including the herpes B virus (which is deadly for humans), tuberculosis, and hepatitis B. In 1997, a Yerkes employee died after being exposed to the herpes B virus. Georgia state law even classifies chimpanzees and macaques as "inherently dangerous to human beings" and bans them as pets for this reason. Yerkes has racked up dozens of violations of federal animal welfare and safety standards over the last decade, including 10 in just last the two years. In 2005, government inspectors cited Yerkes for structural problems in its primate-housing facilities, observing that the problems could lead to "animal injury or escape." In 2007, Yerkes was assessed a $15,000 fine for other federal violations. Last week,  urging the U.S. Department of Agriculture to investigate the recent monkey escape. For more information, please visit PETA.org.