AceShowbiz - Anjelica Huston has begged the director of America's National Institutes of Health (NIH) to halt ineffective monkey experiments.

The actress is spearheading a new PETA campaign to end 'fright tests' on apes, which involve scaring them with fake snakes and spiders.

Bosses at the animal rights group are particularly concerned about NIH researcher Elisabeth Murray's "psychology experiments" on monkeys, which have received more than $36 million in taxpayer funding over the past 13 years, even though they've never led to the development of a single treatment for humans.

"People are dying for lack of ventilators, effective treatments, and even hospital beds, and many Americans are now confronting difficult choices about the best way to use their shrinking resources. NIH is in a similar position," Huston writes in her open letter to Francis Collins. "Studies that are pointless, wasteful, or extremely cruel should be ended now, and that means the emphasis should be placed on non-animal studies, because they offer real promise."

"I urge you in the strongest possible terms to end these monkey-fright experiments and reorder your agency's priorities so that your focus is on human-relevant research and human health."

Huston's letter follows a drive-by protest outside Collins' and Murray's homes and the NIH building on April 21.