They vaccinated nine monkeys at the San Diego Zoo against the coronavirus

The non-human patients were four orangutans and five bonobos to whom the first dose was applied in February, the National Geopraphic website reported on Friday. In the same zoo, eight gorillas were infected with coronavirus. To date, more than half a million people have died from Covid-19 in the United States.

“In my career, I haven’t had access to an experimental vaccine so early in the process and I haven’t had such an overwhelming desire to want to use one,” said Nadine Lamberski, head of conservation at the zoo. from San Diego, California. .

The coronavirus vaccine for animals was developed by the veterinary laboratory Zoetis, which took over the task in February 2020, when it was confirmed that a dog had contracted Covid-19.

As the vaccines are designed to attack the pathogen, they can generally be used in all animals, so monkeys were the first to receive the doses before dogs and cats, and other Covid-19 patients, such as tigers. , lions, snow leopards, cougars. , ferrets and minks.

Among the beneficiaries was Karen, the orangutan who, in 1994, pioneered by being the first of its kind to undergo open heart surgery.

Vaccination of monkeys is important because their social structure is common to very close families, so isolation is not an option in the event of a possible coronavirus epidemic.

Lamberski explained that the current case “is not the norm” and that an experimental vaccine is not generally applied to animals at the San Diego Zoo, but given the circumstances of the pandemic, an exception was made.