[RETRACTED] NIH Contractor Reportedly Under Federal Investigation for 'Hideous' Puppy Experiments
RETRACTION, Aug. 5, 2022: Weeks prior to the publication of this article, in a fact check dated Nov. 2, 2021, and then updated on Nov. 8, 2021, Factcheck.org debunked the claim that the Anthony Fauci-run NIAID had funded the study in question.
UPDATE, Dec. 29, 2021: Following the publication of this story, NIH responded via email late Wednesday with this statement: “NIH has purchased from Envigo Cumberland in the past, but no future purchases are planned. NIH’s Office of Laboratory Animal Welfare (OLAW), which provides oversight of all NIH-supported research activities that involve animals, takes very seriously all allegations concerning animal welfare and appropriate animal care in NIH-funded studies. “NIH generally does not discuss whether or not animal welfare-related investigations are taking place, and NIH does not comment on ongoing investigations if such investigations are underway.”
The Department of Agriculture is investigating a supplier who provided the animals for the National Institutes of Health’s alleged grisly beagle puppy experiments, a senior executive from the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals told Fox News on Tuesday
“They have been cited … for direct and critical violations,” Daphna Nachminovitch, PETA’s senior cruelty investigations vice president, said on “Tucker Carlson Tonight.”
The supplier is accused of “failure to provide basic necessities of life to these nursing mother dogs and their puppies, keeping animals in temperatures as high as 92 degrees without … air conditioning, plunging needles into the heads of puppies to drain hematomas … and so much more,” Nachminovitch said.
The NIH spends approximately $19.6 billion annually to finance experiments on animals, according to Nachminovitch. The agency also has signed contracts costing over $1.2 million across the last decade for the purchase of beagles that were subject to the agency’s experimentation, she said.
White House chief medical adviser Anthony Fauci heads NIH’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
An investigation by the White Coat Waste Project found that Fauci’s agency spent $424,000 “to commission a study in which healthy beagles are given an experimental drug and then intentionally infested with flies that carry a disease-causing parasite that affects humans,” the group said in a July blog post.
A month later, the White Coat Waste Project said its investigators had found that the NIAID “shipped part of a $375,800 grant to a lab in Tunisia … to drug beagles and lock their heads in mesh cages filled with hundreds of infected sand flies.”
In November, PETA called for the resignations of Fauci and other senior NIH officials linked to the scandal.
Asked on Fox News why beagles are the choice animals for such experimentation, Nachminovitch said, “Beagles are small and docile. They’re such gentle, loyal dogs, and unfortunately they are so submissive that they’re easy to torture without posing a public safety risk to their abusers.”
She said the dogs were being raised especially for “cruel experiments that are useless.”
One supplier giving NIH the animals for its experiments is Virginia-based Envigo, according to Fox News. It reported that Envigo had sold around 5,000 beagles to NIH and other laboratories, where they underwent confinement and torture. This supplier is the target of a federal investigation.
According to a Sunday report from The Washington Post, when federal investigators carried out a routine surprise investigation of an Envigo-run facility in Cumberland, Virginia, in July, they found that those managing the facility had committed a plethora of animal welfare offenses.
Federal officials who examined the facility noted in an October USDA investigation report shared by PETA that in a seven-month period, over 300 pups died due to “unknown causes.” Records on the deaths were incomplete, the report said.
“165 puppies under 5 weeks of age were found dead and the cause of death is identified as ‘unknown’ in the medical records. Individual medical records are not recorded for puppies less than 5 weeks old, instead litter records are maintained,” USDA Veterinary Medical Officer Diana Care wrote in the report.
Investigators also found sanitation issues in the facility, according to the USDA report.
Nachminovitch described the conditions as “hideous.”
The report said that “waste gutters below the main sheltered housing of Buildings G1, G2, and G3 contained a large accumulation of feces, urine, standing water, insects (both dead and alive) and uneaten food under the raised indoor and outdoor kennel floors.”
“Inside the buildings, below the raised kennel floors there is an accumulation of feces, urine, insects (dead and alive), and food. Large numbers of cobwebs are present at the access points to the drain trough, which in some cases impede visualization of the length of the trough,” it said.
Nachminovitch said the USDA investigation was ongoing.
Envigo did not immediately respond to The Western Journal’s requests for comment.
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