WARNING: This story contains graphic content
After more than a day of scratching at his protruding brain implant until it bled, Kenny, a research macaque who lives inside a York University lab, reportedly pulled out the implant from his right ear, revealing an oozing wound.
Kenny is one of at least nine research macaques held at York — Canada’s fourth largest university — as part of its biomedical research into brain systems controlling vision and actions of the eyes, head and hand. The treatment of those macaques is the subject of a formal inquiry by the Canadian Council on Animal Care (CCAC).
Video footage recorded inside the lab between September 2024 and March 2025 by a whistleblower working with the U.S.-based group Last Chance for Animals (LCA) revealed macaques outfitted with metal head posts extending upward from the top of their heads, protected by acrylic caps.
Some macaques were recorded constantly pacing and swaying in their cages, scratching at the implants, and struggling to swallow in tight collar restraints.
York University said that the macaques in the footage, which the Investigative Journalism Bureau (IJB) shared with it, are in its care and currently healthy.
Reporters also examined health records that the whistleblower says were photographed at the lab from 2009 to 2025. The records cited several health issues, including injuries due to repeated escapes and infections in the head and eye area where research implants, such as eye...
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