Overcoming the barriers to the retirement of Old and New World monkeys from research facilities

In this commentary I aim to raise awareness among researchers and sanctuary directors to potential barriers to retiring Old and New World monkeys from research facilities. I define a barrier as an opinion or stereotype that prevents primate retirement from occurring on a regular basis. By discussing retirement barriers and recommending how to overcome them, I aim to increase the frequency of retiring monkeys from the laboratory into naturalistic sanctuaries. In this article I compile a final list of 10 barriers to retirement—and recommendations on how to overcome them—based on responses to forums, comments from primate sanctuary directors, information contained in scientific and sanctuary literature, and personal experiences. I conclude that researchers will increase the frequency of primate retirement by performing the following 5 actions: (a) increase communication by networking with sanctuaries, (b) prevent negative publicity by developing a confidentiality clause with the sanctuary, (c) increase understanding by reviewing the articles written on retiring monkeys into sanctuaries, (d) increase funding for primate retirement by including funding requests in grant proposals, or (e) by raising private funds.