She’d spent a lifetime helping save chimps and when she founded the Jane Goodall Institute in 1977, she cemented her legacy.

But even the great doctor couldn’t have predicted that one simple gesture from a chimpanzee could essentially change her life.

In the early 2010s, a branch of the Institute located in the Republic of Congo welcomed a new ape: Wounda.

When she arrived, Wounda was in bad shape and fighting for her life; she’d been rescued from poachers who’d planned to butcher poor Wounda as part of the illegal bushmeat trading racket.

As you might expect, captured apes aren’t treated well.

Wounda was bruised and malnourished, and she couldn’t even walk or feed herself. Even Dr. Goodall didn’t hold out much hope:

“When I saw the photographs of Wounda as she came to the sanctuary. I didn’t see how she could possibly have lived.”

But survive she did, and she even went through the first ever blood transfusion from chimp to chimp. Finally, Wounda started to improve.

She grew from a skeletal 63 pounds to a nice robust 110 pounds, and she made plenty of other friends at the sanctuary, too!

But before she would be released to be with other chimps, she had one more person to thank: the doctor who’d dedicated her to life to helping Wounda’s kind.

Wounda turned to Dr. Goodall and suddenly, with cameras rolling, the ape did something so extraordinary, even Dr. Goodall was fighting the tears.

The rehabilitated chimp gave Jane a tender hug.

It was a moment to remember for all involved, especially Dr. Goodall. And some months later, Wounda gave birth to a gorgeous baby chimp, who was named Hope.

Talk about a turnaround!

But the grateful animal wasn’t about to let such a good deed go unpunished; hence, the unbelievable gesture that will remain etched in Dr. Goodall’s mind forever.

Source: Honest to Paws

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