The Office of the Attorney General of the Nation, the Comptroller General, the Autonomous Corporation of Valle and even the Ministry of Sciences itself put the magnifying glass on the Caucaseco scientific research center, located in the city of Cali, Valle del Cauca, and which promised the vaccine against malaria. It was denounced that there was alleged mistreatment of the monkeys with which they were experimenting, such as poor diet, lack of veterinary care and extreme dirt in captivity places, among other insults. Even during the inspection they found one of the primates dead, according to authorities.
Sócrates Herrera and Myriam Arévalo directed it and received donations of more than 17 million dollars from the National Institute of Health of the United States, from the Colombian State, which has transferred more than 32 billion pesos to them through Colciencias and royalty resources. intended for research.
At the time, the couple of scientists was on the red carpet in the world of research on the planet, received all kinds of international recognition and even from the then mayor of Cali, Rodrigo Guerrero.
A person who worked for them in Caucaseco spoke of the irregularities he found at the research center.
“Since I started working there, I was surprised by the facilities where the primates were, to the extent that it was said that one of the companies that this married couple, Sócrates Herrera and Myriam Arévalo, had was the Fundación Centro of Primates. However, the name that seems to be from a fairly representative company was nothing more than a cambuche, that is, a hut with a mesh fence with a canvas on top in which they kept more than 100 monkeys in cages, ”she recounted.
“Due to the staff capacity they had, which was two people to care for the monkeys, these two people were not enough for them to clean up and keep the monkeys in good condition,” said the witness.
In March 2023, the research center that experiments with monkeys was sealed by the authorities and, last weekend, Invima suspended the International Vaccine Center that was conducting human studies.
Magnolia Martínez, leader of special projects of the investigation department of Laboratorios Peta, which translates to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, said that they approached “this case of Caucaseco due to the issue of animal abuse, we were particularly interested in seeing which institutions in Latin America were receiving funds from the United States; Caucaseco and the International Vaccine Center are two of these organizations and we began to gather information, and at that moment we received a complaint from a person who told us about the terrible confinement conditions of these monkeys and we continued our investigation, we realized that that the problems not only had animal victims, there were also potential human victims and the Invima findings that were brought to light over the weekend confirm this information”.
“In addition, there is the sanctioning process by the Regional Autonomous Corporation of Valle del Cauca, they confirmed our complaint, made an inspection and found deplorable conditions, the corpse of a baby monkey, the day of the inspection, an inspection that was scheduled , this was not surprising; the Comptroller’s Office found irregularities in the management of resources. We are waiting for Minciencias to make a statement on the results of this investigation, this ministry was the first to say that it was going to investigate, but to date we have not received the results of this process, ”he added.
The official specified that, from information from the Comptroller’s Office, she knew that “Minciencias must collaborate with other authorities and provide all the information about the million-dollar contracts that have been given to these people in exchange for nothing, in exchange for animal abuse, abuse of Afro-Colombian communities where malaria is endemic and a huge waste of public resources.”
For Martínez, “this is an opportunity for researchers in Latin America, particularly in Colombia, to innovate and stop using animals, since drugs that are tested on animals have already been proven to be successful in 95% of cases.” animals fail when tested on humans.”
Noticias Caracol has tried to contact Sócrates Herrera and Myriam Arévalo, but so far it has not been possible, nor has it been possible to speak with their representatives.
2023-08-10 16:10:38
#investigate #alleged #mistreatment #monkeys #Caucaseco #vaccine #malaria
