Madison, Wis. — In a letter sent today, PETA urges the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to investigate likely violations of the federal Animal Welfare Act at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (UW-Madison) after multiple fights among caged, stressed monkeys at the federally funded Wisconsin National Primate Research Center caused severe injuries, including the amputation of one monkey’s arm.

PETA obtained records showing that a rhesus macaque was attacked in January by a monkey in an adjacent cage through an unsecured food-delivery opening, resulting in injuries so severe that the macaque’s arm had to be amputated. A month later, staff failed to secure interlocking doors between two cages, and macaques fought, leaving one with a traumatic oral injury requiring extensive treatment. Frightened, traumatized monkeys in small, confined spaces are known to attack other monkeys, making the regulation for secure housing crucial.

The incidents follow an alarming pattern of serious violations of the federal Animal Welfare Act in the university’s laboratories.

Since 2024, the USDA has cited the university for eight violations, six critical, including the deaths of two monkeys from an unapproved procedure and repeated incidents in which staff allowed monkeys to access neighboring cages, resulting in injuries.

In 2023, the USDA took the rare step of fining UW-Madison $77,000 for a whopping 20 violations of federal animal welfare laws, including a strangulation death when a monkey’s head became trapped in a chain.

“UW-Madison’s own records show that its repeated failure to follow even the most basic animal welfare guidelines has left monkeys mutilated, injured, and dead,” says PETA Vice President Alka Chandna. “Experiments on monkeys are under scrutiny by the federal government—and funding for UW-Madison’s primate laboratories should be among the first cut.”

According to UW-Madison’s 2025 annual report, the university caged or experimented on more than 2,400 monkeys while receiving more than $397 million in grants from the National Institutes of Health, funding contingent on compliance with animal welfare standards.

More than 150,000 PETA supporters have called on UW-Madison to shut down its primate laboratories and transition to superior, human-relevant research.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to experiment on”—points out that Every Animal Is Someone and offers free Empathy Kits for people who need a lesson in kindness. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow PETA on X, Facebook, or Instagram.

Contact:

Tasgola Bruner 404-693-3285; TasgolaB@peta.org