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Chaos unfolded when activists pushed back against Cornell Medical College security guards who tried to stop a legal protest against the school’s dean, Dr. Laurie Glimcher. As a member of the board of the New York Blood Center (NYBC), Dr. Glimcher signed off on the organization’s plan to abandon 66 chimpanzees in Liberia with no food or water.

Activists have staged three protests at Cornell Medical College demanding that Dr. Glimcher reinstate funding for NYBC’s ex-lab chimps. During the first two protests, students, faculty and staff exiting the building were instructed by school officials to ignore the activists, and they were given handouts exonerating Dr. Glimcher.

A man exiting Cornell spits on an activist protesting Dr. Laurie Glimcher

When that strategy backfired, by triggering a louder and more disruptive activist presence, Cornell’s security team diverted people leaving the premises to a side exit and then created a human blockade to keep activists several hundred feet away. The school’s approach again backfired, as the increased repression only served to generate more outrage from both the activists and people exiting Cornell who were disturbed by the commotion.

Cornell security guards block activists from protesting on a public sidewalk

NYBC left its former chimps on six islands near Monrovia, the country’s capital, with no food or water after experimenting on them for 30 years; earning $500 million in royalties off of the research; and promising to provide them with lifelong care.

In a letter to the NY Blood Center, Jane Goodall said the organization has a “moral obligation” to pay for the chimps’ care.

Please join the Facebook page: New York Blood Center: Do the Right Thing to participate in the online actions. If you live in New York City, please join the protests targeting New York Blood Center board members at their homes and offices.

Activists demand that NYBC board member Laurie Glimcher reinstates funding for the group’s ex-lab chimps

New York Blood Center (NYBC) board member Dr. Laurie Glimcher instructed the faculty, staff and students of Weill Cornell Medical College, where she is the Dean, to ignore New Yorkers who gathered at the school’s main entrance to protest NYBC’s decision to abandon chimpanzees in Liberia. With the vast majority of people from Cornell refusing to engage with or acknowledge the protesters and with many people actually laughing at them, activists had little incentive to be polite or professional:

NYBC left 66 chimps on islands near Monrovia, the country’s capital, with no food or water after experimenting on them for 30 years; earning $500 million in royalties off of the research; and making a promise to provide them with lifelong care.

Weill Cornell student suggests that activists are misinformed. Is Dr. Jane Goodall misinformed too?

In addition to instructing students, faculty and staff to ignore the protesters, Cornell distributed handouts, which attempt to distance Dr. Glimcher from NYBC’s crime, as people exited the building directly into the protest.

Students, faculty and staff at Weill Cornell Medical College laugh at and ignore activists protesting the Dean, Dr. Laurie Glimcher, who is on the board of the NY Blood Center

Students, faculty and staff at Cornell expressed no compassion for the chimps abandoned by their Dean, Dr. Laurie Glimcher of the NY Blood Center

Please join the Facebook page: New York Blood Center: Do the Right Thing to participate in the online actions. If you live in New York City, please join the protests targeting New York Blood Center board members at their homes and offices.

Activists protest Dr. Laurie Glimcher of the New York Blood Center at her 16 room condo in NYC

Please join the Facebook page New York Blood Center: Do the Right Thing to join the campaign to compel Laurie Glimcher and the other NYBC board members to reinstate funding for the chimps.

Activists march from Laurie Glimcher’s office to her home in NYC

One day after activists staged a third protest at the home of its Chairman of the Board on August 4th, the New York Blood Center (NYBC) posted a stunning public statement (Q&A) defending its decision to cut off funding to its former lab chimps (see below).

In the Q&A, which it has since removed from its website, NYBC argues that it neither owns nor has responsibility for the chimps; that the blame for their plight lies with animal welfare organizations who refused to take them; and that their priority is helping humans, not chimpanzees.

With no natural food on the islands where they were relocated, the chimps eagerly await the delivery of food

“We have no obligation to these chimpanzees.”  In an effort to distance itself from its chimps, NYBC asserts that the government of Liberia owns them and is responsible for their care. Nowhere in its statement does NYBC acknowledge that they captured the chimps from the wild; bred them in captivity; conducted experiments on them for 30 years; and dropped them off on islands with no natural food and water, rendering them totally dependent on humans for survival.

Language about ownership in contracts between NYBC and the government of Liberia doesn’t change the fact that NYBC has a moral obligation to pay for their care. In fact, previous executives at NYBC publicly acknowledged this obligation.

In its Q&A, NYBC asserts that Dr. Prince was not authorized to make this statement.

“The animal welfare groups did nothing to help us.” NYBC claims that it attempted to work with animal welfare organizations to find a long term solution for the chimps, but, according to individuals involved in those discussions, NYBC merely attempted to shift the responsibility to these groups without offering to pay for the expenses, such as expanding the sanctuaries to accommodate the chimps and providing them with food and medical care for the remainder of their lives. During these discussions, NYBC was well aware of the fact that great ape sanctuaries in Africa, which are chronically short on space and financial resources, could not assume the millions of dollars in costs associated with caring for its chimps.

Chimp greet a volunteer who brings them food

“Our obligation is to humans. Other organizations better suited to funding and supporting the chimps.” NYBC also justifies its decision to eliminate funding for the chimps on the grounds that humans are a greater priority: “Our mission is to save lives here in the United States. NYBC’s responsibility is to blood donors, hospitals and patients.”

Even if one subscribes to the point of view that humans are more worthy of life than other animals, NYBC doesn’t have to make that choice. The organization, which pays its President over $1.2 million and has $450 million in assets, has earned $500 million in royalties from their chimp research. Even if NYBC was not a wealthy organization backed by some of the biggest corporations in the United States, it would still have a moral obligation to pay for the care of their chimps.

Jane Goodall’s letter to the New York Blood Center

In a demonstration of its lack of ethics, NYBC describes the islands to which they relocated the chimps as “sanctuaries,” even though they have no caretakers, facilities or infrastructure. Given that the chimps had no survival skills and were traumatized by decades of experiments, they should have been relocated to accredited sanctuaries where they would have received much needed care as soon as they were released. Instead, they have been struggling to survive on isolated islands, at times going several days without food and water. Over the years, many of the chimps have needlessly died from starvation.

In a statement entitled “Left To Die In Liberia,” the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) paints a picture of just how difficult the animals’ lives on the islands: “One chimp bargained for food by offering his leg to the caregivers, as he would have done in the lab when being darted.”

Captive chimp at NYBC’s research facility in Liberia

Q&A Posted on NYBC’s website on August 6th

Please join the Facebook page New York Blood Center: Do the Right Thing in order to participate in the online actions and keep apprised of the campaign to compel NYBC to reinstate funding for the chimps.

As Chairman of the New York Blood Center, real estate magnate Howard Milstein bears responsibility for the organization’s decision to cut funding for its former lab chimps who are living on six islands in Liberia. In an effort to convince him to fulfill his promise to provide lifelong care for the 67 surviving apes, New Yorkers have begun staging dramatic protests in front of the billionaire’s Park Avenue apartment building.

In spite of global pressure to reinstate the funding for the chimps, the NY Blood Center is digging in its heels, stating that it doesn’t own the them and that the government of Liberia is responsible for their care. They do not acknowledge that NYBC captured the chimps in the wild; bred them in captivity: held them prisoner in cages; experimented on them for 30 years; earned $500 million off the research; moved them to islands with no natural source of food and water; and made multiple promises to provide them with lifelong care.

Real estate tycoon Howard Milstein is Chairma of the Board of the NY Blood Center

TV journalist Jane Velez-Mitchell of Jane UnChained attended the first protest at Mr. Milstein’s home and filed this report:

The Real Deal, a real estate publication read by Howard Milstein’s peers, also has also reported on the grass roots campaign against him and the NYBC.

As New Yorkers prepare to expand the protests to the homes other NYBC board members, hundreds, if not thousands, of advocates in other parts of the world are taking action against the the Blood Center by participating in a grass roots campaign organized by the Facebook group, New York Blood Center: Do the Right Thing.

New Yorkers protest outside the home of Howard Milstein

In the streets, online and in the media, the NY Blood Center is being pressured to resume funding for the chimps’ care. On July 24th, the Daily Mail – one of the most widely circulated news publications in the world – posted a story that went viral: “Battle to Save the Hugging Chimps: Heartbreaking Story of 66 Apes and a Baby ‘Abandoned’ on Island by Medical Firm after They Finished Experimenting on Them.”

NYBC Chairman Howard Milstein cut funding to provide food and water to the organization’s lab chimps after earning $500 million in royalties off of the research.

Please join the Facebook group New York Blood Center: Do the Right Thing and the Facebook page Take Action: Save New York Blood Center Chimps to see how you can help.