• A new White Coat Waste (WCW) investigation exposes that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) recently doled out new funding to a kitten torture colony at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (UW-M), despite the agency claiming it is “working tirelessly” to “phase out” cat experiments.
• Documents obtained by WCW through state and federal open records requests reveal that nearly 300 kittens will be intentionally bred to suffer from glaucoma.
• Kittens are killed before they’re one day old to have their eyes cut and dissected. Other kittens, just 12 weeks old, endure eye injections and experiments before being slaughtered at around one year old.
• The UW-M colony and its deadly kitten tests received a brand-new $439,016 grant from the NIH in August 2025. 
• These experiments have been funded by nearly $5 million in taxpayer money from the NIH since 2008.
• Trump’s NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya and his ‘animal testing czar’ Nicole Kleinstreuer falsely claim that funding for barbaric cat tests “predates” their tenure.
• WCW’s top priority for the Trump Administration is to defund these and all other taxpayer-funded cat and dog labs. 

A new White Coat Waste (WCW) investigation exposes how, despite promising this summer to “phase out” cat testing, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) under Director Jay Bhattacharya and ‘animal testing czar’ Nicole Kleinstreuer is funding more cat-astrophic cruelty, secrecy, and waste.

This July, we uncovered how the NIH extended Temple University’s cat heart failure tests, paid for by your tax dollars. The agency defended it. 

In August, we sued the NIH for access to records about its funding for kitten abuse. 

As first reported by The Guardian, we’ve now secured receipts for grisly, new NIH-funded experiments on kittens at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (UW-M) and other U.S. laboratories. 

Thanks to my pushback, @DeptVetAffairs has completely ended cat testing, proving it can be done. Cats and dogs are family, and the federal government should not be using taxpayer dollars to harm them in unnecessary research.https://t.co/OTCGCnczXV

— Dina Titus (@repdinatitus) December 3, 2025

Welcome to the NIH’s Kittengate—and it’s even worse than you think.

At UW-M, the NIH is bankrolling a cat torture colony that has been active for nearly two decades.  

New records obtained by WCW through state and federal open records requests reveal that nearly 300 kittens will be intentionally bred to suffer from glaucoma.   

The UW-M colony and its deadly kitten tests received a brand-new $439,016 grant from the NIH in August 2025. These experiments have been funded by nearly $5 million in taxpayer money from the NIH since 2008. 

Some kittens are killed before they’re one day old to have their eyes cut and dissected. Since cats are born with their eyelids fused shut, experimenters forcibly cut them open with blunt scissors and stitch them back for repeated testing. 

Other kittens, just 12 weeks old, receive injections directly into their eyes. After months of exams, these kittens are slaughtered at around one year old so their eyes can be removed for further testing. 

162 glaucoma and normal cats are subjected to multiple rounds of drug testing, then killed so their eyes can be harvested. Of these, at least 32 will be killed between birth and 12 weeks old.  

These kittens aren’t just numbers on a page—they’re real victims. Here are details from records uncovered by WCW about a few of the animals inside UW-M’s kitten torture colony: 

Mouse is a shy cat who has been used as a breeder for over three years. He was prescribed gabapentin to ease his anxiety, but a single dose left him hiding under a blanket for a full day. Months passed before he seemed “friendly” again—now, he looks forward to human company and even sits waiting to be petted. Regardless, he remains locked in UW-M’s lab, suffering from vomiting episodes and dental disease.  

Blossom has been experimented on since she was eight weeks old. She first displayed behavioral distress in October 2024, including pacing, hissing at other cats, and fearfulness. She was isolated, then placed in a larger enclosure—but nothing helped. NIH-funded experimenters suspected she was going blind. Despite her mood changes, she was reported as “calm, friendly and purring” while being handled. Blossom’s white coat “friends” rewarded her for her good behavior by killing her before her first birthday. 

Eagle, the oldest cat in the colony, has spent nine years trapped at UW-M. Born with glaucoma, his left eye is cloudy and has a cataract. He lives with debilitating dental disease, ulcers, and eyelid twitching—and has known nothing but misery his entire life. 

Bhattacharya and Kleinstreuer falsely claim that these and other barbaric cat tests “predate” their tenure. The truth is, they have issued new funding for Fauci-era projects and issued millions in new grants for horrific tests on cats like these.

This isn’t a phase-out. It’s a ramp-up. 

Documents WCW uncovered expose a flood of new and renewed dog and cat lab grants under Bhattacharya and Kleinstreuer, including:

• A new grant to a University of Missouri-Columbia lab that breeds golden retrievers to suffer from crippling diseases. 
• Additional grant money for Fauci’s maximum-pain experiments on beagles bought from a disgraced breeder with 300+ violations. 
• Another $24 million for experimental drug testing on beagles by pharmaceutical companies worldwide, including $916,400 for weight-loss drug testing.
• More funding for spinal cord injury experiments on month-old kittens in Canada. 
• Extended grants to the University of Utah to induce deadly heart rhythm disorders in dogs. 
• A new 5-year, $7.2 million grant to breed puppies to suffer from excruciating bleeding disorders.

Unlike the NIH, WCW is working tirelessly to shut down Kittengate and every single NIH-funded cat torture chamber. 

For years, WCW has been leading the fight to expose and defund the NIH’s feline torture, including working with Congress to pass the bipartisan Preventing Animal Abuse and Waste Act.

Last year, we stopped a Fauci-funded lab at the University of California-Davis from breeding kittens and force-feeding them diseased mouse brains. Thirty cats, including Mochi and Marigold, were saved because of WCW’s investigation. 

The key to cutting all of the kitten cruelty that Kleinstreuer herself once called “unconscionable” is simple: