A new investigation from White Coat Waste Project has exposed that taxpayers have been funding cruel and deadly tests on kittens in a secretive U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) laboratory in Beltsville, Maryland.
The right-wing organization is now working with Congress to stop it.
WCW prides themselves on being both animal lovers and liberty lovers. Their goal, according to their website, is to “STOP taxpayer-funded experiments on dogs, monkeys, cats and other animals, we must stop wasteful government spending. Our approach? Drain the swamp: cut federal spending that hurts animals and Americans.”
According to their new report, documents obtained by WCW through the Freedom of Information Act include their experimental protocols, animal purchase orders and photographs.
The documents reveal that a USDA Agricultural Research Service laboratory “breeds 100 kittens a year, feeds the 2-month-old kittens Toxoplasma-infected raw meat, collects their feces for 2-3 weeks to harvest the parasite for use in other experiments, and then kills, bags and incinerates the kittens like they’re trash.”
“The USDA kills all of the kittens, even though it admits that virtually all of them are healthy after the experiments. Expert authorities–including the American Veterinary Medical Association, the American Association of Veterinary Medical Colleges and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention–agree that Toxoplasma-exposed cats are safe and adoptable because after just one Toxoplasma exposure, cats shed the parasite, become immune and won’t transmit to humans or other animals,” the report adds.
The USDA currently spends $650,000 of taxpayer’s money annually on the testing.
Congressman Mike Bishop (R-MI), who has been at the forefront of the efforts to end taxpayer funded animal testing, is now demanding answers. Following the release of WCW’s findings, he sent a strongly worded letter to Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue accusing the USDA of using “kittens as test tubes.”
“Put simply, it creates life to destroy life,” he added. “While I support the objective of making food safer and protecting people and animals from infectious diseases, we must ensure taxpayer dollars are used effectively, efficiently and humanely.”
Bishop has now joined forces with House Agriculture Committee member Rep. Jimmy Panetta (D-CA) to introduce a bill called the KITTEN Act to end the wasteful and cruel killing.
“I’m proud to introduce the bipartisan KITTEN Act to put a stop to USDA’s tax-funded experiments on cats and kittens. My constituents and other Americans have made it clear that they don’t want the federal government spending their hard-earned tax dollars to abuse and kill cats in cruel, inhumane and outdated experiments. The USDA must stop killing kittens, and I hope to work collaboratively with the agency towards that goal,” Bishop said in a statement about the bill.
According to a 2016 poll by Lincoln Park Strategies, 75% of US voters oppose cat experiments.
In 2018, Congress enacted legislation that cut funding for dog experiments at the VA, largely due to work done by WCW.
If you wish to support the cause or learn more about what is going on, visit USDA Stinks.
