Bukit Merah Laketown Resort

The Infant Care Unit (ICU) is a breeding unit specifically-designed to encourage the increase in population of the orang utans, providing them with veterinary care and to ensure that are able to eventually adapt to their natural habitat and have a higher survival rate as a result.

The objectives of the ICU are:

• Providing veterinary care for abandoned orang utan infants.
• Creating public awareness on the conservation of the endangered species.
• Providing an opportunity for the general public to see how veterinanry care is delivered first-hand.
• Increasing the population of the species via "ex-situ" programme, in line with the national wildlife conservation of endangered species.
• Encouraging public participation through its baby orang utan adoption programme.

During birth, there are instances where the infants may be required to be separated from the mother and taken into care at the ICU for the following reasons,

• failure of the mother to lactate or produce enough milk,
• premature birth,
• poor growth rate, or
• lack of maternal care from the mother.

Infants separated from the mother will undergo a series of clinical diagnosis, treatments, recovery and rehabilitation programme, which is carried out internally and externally to ensure the babies' ability to adapt to its natural environment. The process is conducted by the Resident Veterinarian, Dr. Sabapathy, and his team of veterinarian assistants.