For nine years the study continued. Fieldworkers at Gombe collected fecal samples from ninety-four different chimpanzees, each of which was known by name and, in most cases, by its individual character and family history. Beatrice Hahn’s people did the analyses, finding that seventeen of those ninety-four chimps were SIV-positive. As time passed, some chimps died. Others disappeared in the forest and were presumed dead when they failed to reappear. Death is often a private matter for wild creatures, including chimpanzees, especially when it comes upon them by slow and painful degrees. They
...more
