Since 2003, We have been agitating for one of the Ebola vaccines in development for humans to be used to protect wild apes. These efforts have gradually evolved into VaccinApe, a loose consortium of individuals and institutions. Because of concerns about the safety of vaccinating wild apes we have gone to great lengths to solicit input from a wide range of primatologists, virologists, vaccine labs, and conservationists, including large expert workshops in 2004 and 2008. The consensus of the experts is that if the process is approached in a rigorous, scientific manner, wild ape vaccination would be safe, effective, and affordable. They also recommend that, for reasons of safety, technical complexity, and cost, a darted vaccine should first be used to vaccinate the relatively small number of gorillas and chimpanzees in research and tourism programs. However, in the long term the most effective way to protect larger numbers of wild apes against Ebola and other disease threats such as human respiratory viruses would be vaccines delivered in oral baits.

Results from these captive and field studies will be included, with extensive results from the human vaccine development program, in an application for veterinary licensing of the Ebola vaccine by the US Department of Agriculture. Once this license has been obtained, a field pilot study will then be used to deliver the vaccine using a hypodermic dart to wild gorillas habituated to human presence. After the pilot study is completed and vaccination success is evaluated, the next step will be a larger program in which gorillas and chimpanzees in multiple research and tourism programs are dart vaccinated. In parallel to these darted vaccination programs, research on oral vaccine delivery will be conducted, with the long term objective of vaccinating large numbers of gorillas and chimpanzees against Ebola and other pathogens; particularly human respiratory viruses transmitted to habituated apes in tourism and research programs. A working group at the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis is also examining efficient strategies for vaccinating apes and comparing the cost-effectiveness of Ebola vaccination to that of other ape conservation strategies.

One fear commonly expressed by primatologists is that vaccination will either injure apes or “stress them out”, thereby, making them more susceptible to disease or intolerant to the approach of researchers or tourists. Some of these fears appear to be driven by the mistaken assumption that vaccination would entail anestheticizing and handling apes. This is simply not the case. Vaccine can be delivered without “knocking down” the animal. This not only eliminates the risk of death under anesthesia, it limits stress to a brief window after the animal is struck by a dart. This very brief window of stress seems unlikely to have a major immunosuppressive effect. Negative effects on wild ape tolerance to humans may also be minimized by concealing the shooter, as wild gorillas and chimpanzees appear not to immediately associate the dart with the darter. One of the attractions of oral vaccination is that induces no stress other than, perhaps, that associated with the presentation of a novel item (i.e. neophobia). Furthermore, new darting technologies greatly reduce the potential for puncture wounds or tissue damage at the injection site.