Happy Nice Mall

There have been other reports of self-medication in animals, including dogs and cats that probably eat grass or plants to help them vomit, and bears and deer who apparently consume medicinal plants to self-medicate. Orangutans have been observed to apply plant material to soothe muscle injuries. However, the researchers know of no previous reports of non-human mammals using insects for a medicinal purpose.

In three instances, the researchers saw chimpanzees use the technique on another chimpanzee. In one case, they saw an adult woman named Carol combing around the flesh wound on the leg of Littlegrey, a grown man. He caught an insect and handed it to Littlegrey, who put it between his lips and transferred it to his wound. Later, Carol and another adult male were seen moving the bug in Littlegrey’s wound. Another adult male approached, pulled the insect out of the wound, put it between his own lips, and then rubbed it back into Littlegrey’s leg.

A chimpanzee, an adult male named Freddy, was a particularly avid user of the pesticide and has repeatedly treated himself for wounds on his head, both arms, lower back, left wrist, and penis. One day, researchers watched him treat himself twice for the same arm injury. Researchers don’t know how Freddy got these wounds, but some probably involved fighting with other men.

There are some animals that cooperate with others in similar ways, said Simone Pika, who leads an animal cognition lab at the University of Osnabrück in Germany and is the study’s author. “But we don’t know of any other examples in mammals,” she said. “This may be a learned behavior that exists only in this group. We don’t know if our chimpanzees are special about it.”

Aaron Sandel, an anthropologist at the University of Texas at Austin, found the work valuable, but also expressed some doubts. “They don’t offer an alternative explanation for the behavior, and they make no connection to what insect it could be,” he said. “Transition to a potential medical function? It’s a stretch at this point.”