Rhesusitation?

Another strange animal consequence of the Covid-19 pandemic is evident in reports from 13th Century Lopburi in Thailand (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/24/we-live-in-a-cage-residents-hide-as-macaque-gangs-take-over-thai-city). Tourists used to be attracted to the town to take selfies whilst feeding bananas to troops of feral Rhesus macaques. The virtual elimination of tourism has meant that the monkeys are no longer getting this food (and the residents can't make money selling it to visitors). The locals now claim to be over-run by these primates (their population doubled to around 6000 in the last 3 years). There is fighting (over food) in the streets and the smell of excrement is overpowering. Somewhat oddly, some people try to placate the macaques by giving them junk food and fizzy drinks (presumably they haven't heard about the negative effects of these items on the behaviour of some human children). There is a capture and sterilisation programme in place to try to reduce the size of the problem.