Gruesome dog testing by VA draws outrage
Experiments caused pain, and then death
The Department of Veterans Affairs is tightening oversight of controversial medical experiments on dogs after an investigation found surgery failures and canine deaths in research projects at a VA facility in Virginia — findings that spurred a push in Congress to defund the experiments altogether.
Nationwide, invasive experiments at three VA facilities are slated to include roughly 300 dogs, including 6-month-old Beagle puppies, and involve surgeries on their brains, spines and hearts by researchers seeking treatments for heart disease and other ailments. All the dogs will be killed when the research is complete.
Going forward, top VA veterinary officials will have to approve any research on dogs, and scientists will have to review proposed dog experiments more rigorously, says Michael
Fallon, the VA’s chief veterinary medical officer.
The moves follow an investigation by the VA’s Office of Research Oversight, which found in May that researchers at the VA facility in Richmond, Va., failed to adequately document whether dogs had been treated properly. Four dogs suffered complications in experimental surgeries.
Those findings helped fuel an effort on Capitol Hill to halt VA dog experiments deemed painful for the dogs. The House quietly passed legislation in July eliminating funding for such research, and now the VA is pushing back and tapping veterans groups to help persuade senators not to pass the measure.
“If this legislation passes the Senate, it would stop potential VA canine research-related medical advancements that offer seriously disabled veterans the hope of a better future,” VA Secretary David Shulkin wrote in a USA TODAY op-ed this month.
He said VA research on dogs has led to important breakthroughs, including development of the implantable cardiac pacemaker and an artificial pancreas that automatically monitors glucose levels and delivers insulin for diabetics.
Opponents say those examples are decades old, and most research hasn’t translated to humans. They contend the VA is relying on outdated models that don’t fully take into account scientific advances that may provide alternatives to dogs as research subjects.
“The VA is abusing its authority and fear-mongering to defend taxpayer-funded experiments on dogs that are cruel and unlikely to help veterans or anybody else,” said Justin Goodman, vice president of White Coat Waste Project, an advocacy group that wants to cut off money for the agency’s dog experiments.
He and others say researchers made the same arguments about chimpanzees until a federal study found that most experiments on chimps were unnecessary and the National Institutes of Health stopped funding research using chimpanzees in 2015.
Only three VA facilities are currently conducting the type of research that would be affected by the House-passed legislation — studies that involve pain for the dogs, including when medications are administered to relieve it.
Dogs work best for these experiments because their heartbeat pacing system is more like humans’ than those in pigs or other large animals, Fallon said.
The VA says dogs accounted for less than 1% of the animals used in agency research last year.
But the issue has touched off a heated debate, given the push on Capitol Hill to eliminate funding for the VA dog experiments.
Opponents of animal testing are seizing on the opportunity to reduce the practice, if only a little, while supporters worry that curbing some practices now will eventually lead to a total ban.
“The dogs are a gateway species,” said Cindy Buckmaster, chair of Americans for Medical Progress, a biomedical and research industry group pushing to protect animal testing. “Ending research with dogs in the VA system is going to lead to the next round of ending research with dogs everywhere.”
Across the country some 60,000 dogs were used in research experiments in 2016. Buckmaster, a professor at Baylor College of Medicine, says that number has declined naturally as scientists have learned they can use different methods or other species to answer the same questions.
Dogs remain critical to medical research, and abolishing dog testing would hurt progress, she said.
Opponents at the White Coat Waste Project say scientists will keep doing the research if left unchecked.
“The scientists can always find a reason to justify what they’re doing,” said Lawrence Hansen, an advisory board member for the group and professor of neuroscience and pathology at the University of California-San Diego School of Medicine. “It’s only people from outside who have managed to limit them at all.”