Topic Background: Primates are important for conducting human health research. This research often requires the animals be confined for long periods and possibly killed. Critics argue that, unlike other lab animals, primates’ mental and emotional lives are so much like our own that basic moral standards and legal protections that apply to humans ought to be extended to primates. Researchers and medical institutions acknowledge the moral dilemma, but argue that without the use of primates the search for a cure of for many diseases will be seriously impaired. Their use must, therefore, continue.