Two Belgian women on the trail of the forgotten chimpanzés in Congo

Belgian epidemiologist Anne Laudisoit has discovered that chimpanzees are living in unique conditions in Congo. She is now underway in tracking them down and the photojournalist Caroline Thirion is filming her journey.

Anne Laudisoit first came to the Democratic Republic of Congo to study a disease that is carried by worms and causes blindness. But on their travels the through mountainous areas, the two Belgians made quite a different discovery. In small patches of forest in these hills and measuring to less than a square kilometre, families of chimpanzees were thriving far away from all human activity.

Experts were baffled as they believed they should not have survived in such a microcosm. So the women returned to find these forgotten primates accompanied by a team from the University of Kisangani. The footage shot throughout this journey is now being compiled into a documentary to present this scientific expedition and is due to be released in autumn 2018, titled – Called Mbudha, sur les traces des chimpanzés (Mbudha, on the trail of the chimpanzees).