The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director, Francis Collins, issued a statement regarding the retirement of the agency’s aging Alamogordo Primate Facility (APF) chimpanzees. The full statement can be read here.
According to the NIH statement, "a panel of NIH veterinarians, independent of the three primate facilities, Chimp Haven, and the NIH Chimpanzee Program, evaluated the remaining 44 APF chimpanzees and advised NIH that it would be a serious risk to the chimpanzees’ health to move them." According to this determination, the remaining chimpanzees will be retired in place.