Descendants of monkeys used in a 1930s Tarzan movie are spreading a strain of herpes B.

A sizable population of wild monkeys is sweeping across the state after being introduced during the 1939 filming of “Tarzan Finds a Son.” There are now an estimated 1,000 rhesus monkeys roaming the Sunshine State — all descended from three males and three females released together in the late 1930s. A Colonel Tooley released them on an island which he called “Monkey Island” as a promotion for the movie thinking that they could not swim. He was wrong. 80 years later, some of the primates have been seen as far away as Jacksonville and Sarasota, more than 100 miles from Silver River State Park in Central Florida, where they began their adventure.

As if having annoying monkeys around isn`t enough, it turns out that they are also carriers of a potentially dangerous virus. A study published last month by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in their journal found that some of the animals excrete a virus that can be dangerous to people. The rhesus macaques in Silver Spring Park are known to carry herpes B. It seems some of the monkeys have the virus in their saliva and other bodily fluids, raising the risk to humans.

Now I do not want to be negative here, but isn`t that how Rene Russo almost died and the whole world population was almost wiped out, but Dustin Hoffman saved us all at the last moment? Or was that a movie?

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