Army Soldier: Rep. Brat is Right to End VA Dog Testing
Military veterans and active duty service members have been some of the most vocal supporters of WCW’s campaign to cut taxpayer funding for wasteful and painful dog experiments at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). In this new letter in the Richmond Times-Dispatch–the city housing the VA’s most painful dog laboratory–a U.S. Army soldier praises Richmond-area Congressman Dave Brat for introducing the bipartisan PUPPERS Act to permanently defund these experiments. The Times-Dispatch editorial board has also come out in support of the bill.
Read the full letter below, and then write your Congress members and urge them to support the bipartisan PUPPERS Act to end taxpayer funding for the most painful dog experiments at the VA.
Brat is right to end dog testing
Editor, Times-Dispatch:
As a soldier, taxpayer, and dog lover, I applaud Rep. Dave Brat for leading new bipartisan legislation — the aptly named PUPPERS Act — to cut federal spending on wasteful and unnecessary dog experiments that are still occurring at Veterans Affairs hospitals in a handful of cities.
At Richmond’s McGuire VA Medical Center, staff induce painful heart attacks in puppies and force them to run on treadmills to stress their compromised hearts. All of the dogs are then killed if they don’t die during the archaic experiments.
Recent investigations by advocates, Congress, and media outlets have found widespread animal cruelty and transparency and accountability failures at the Richmond dog testing lab. What’s more, federal agencies openly admit these kinds of animal tests rarely apply to humans and waste billions of dollars.
Every minute and penny the VA squanders on torturing puppies in outdated and wasteful experiments — and on trying to defend them — means less help that can be provided to veterans and wounded warriors who are suffering and dying because they can’t receive basic care and services from the agency.
Congress passing Brat’s Preventing Unkind and Painful Procedures and Experiments on Respected Species (PUPPERS) Act would be a great step toward reforming and modernizing the VA so it gets back to its mission of serving veterans.
Tyler Spires, U.S. Army
Richmond, VA
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