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Chimpanzees are dying from our colds — these scientists are trying to save them

Humans are increasingly passing pathogens to animal populations, imperilling endangered species such as chimpanzees and gorillas.
  1. Rachel Nuwer

    1. Rachel Nuwer is a freelance writer based in New York City.

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Tourists look at and photograph a Mountain Gorilla of the Muhoza group in Volcanoes National Park, Rwanda.

Tourists on trips to view great apes often violate safety guidelines by not wearing masks and failing to stay 7 metres away from the animals. Credit: Edwin Remsberg/VWPics/UIG/Getty

There was something wrong with the chimpanzees. For weeks, a community of 205 animals in Uganda’s Kibale National Park had been coughing, sneezing and looking generally miserable. But no one could say for sure what ailed them, even as the animals began to die.

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Nature 625, 442-446 (2024)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-00108-6

Updates & Corrections

  • Correction 18 January 2024: An earlier version of this story erroneously stated that the Facebook post about the chimpanzee in Kibale was posted this year.

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