Which specific animal testing projects or institutions lost funding from the $28 million cut?
Executive summary
A joint investigation by CBS News and The Post and Courier identified nearly $28 million in canceled federal grants tied to controversial animal experiments, but the reporting names only a handful of specific projects — most prominently a University of Pittsburgh kidney-transplant study using monkeys that received $1.4 million from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases — leaving the full inventory of exact projects and institutions behind the $28 million unclear [1].
1. The $28 million figure and its provenance
The nearly $28 million total comes from a joint media probe cited by The Post and Courier and CBS News that cataloged canceled federal grants described as “controversial animal projects” amid a broader efficiency and anti-waste push; the report framed those cancellations as part of an initiative by the Department of Government Efficiency tied to Elon Musk’s office to pare “wasteful spending” [1].
2. The one project the reporting names: Pitt kidney-transplant research in monkeys
The clearest, named casualty in the coverage is a kidney-transplant project at the University of Pittsburgh that plans transplants in monkeys supplied by Alpha Genesis in Yemassee and would euthanize animals at study conclusion; that study received about $1.4 million in July from NIAID, according to the reporting and the White Coat Waste Project’s cataloging [1].
3. What else the sources point to — military contracts and other agency shifts
Separate investigations and advocacy groups have flagged roughly $29 million in active military contracts funding painful experiments on dogs and cats, a figure White Coat Waste Project publicized; Stars and Stripes reported the defense bill language banning some painful tests and noted an investigation identifying at least 10 such military contracts worth roughly $29 million, but that is presented as a distinct tally from the nearly $28 million in canceled NIH grants [2].
4. Limits of the public record: named institutions versus aggregated totals
Beyond the University of Pittsburgh kidney project, the joint reporting and the sources made available do not list a comprehensive roster tying each canceled grant dollar to a specific institution or experiment — the nearly $28 million is an aggregated cancellation figure and the Post and Courier piece cites examples rather than a complete line-item accounting, leaving gaps about which other labs, universities, or foreign programs lost funding [1].
5. Motives, advocates and competing narratives behind the cuts
Reporting and advocacy around these cancellations come from actors with clear agendas — watchdog groups such as White Coat Waste and animal-rights organizations like PETA have pushed for cuts and publicized specific contracts or grants [2] [3] — while the Department of Government Efficiency’s framing of “wasteful spending” (as cited by Post and Courier) and broader federal moves to reduce animal testing (for example EPA and NIH policy shifts toward nonanimal methods) supply policy context that complicates whether cancellations reflect scientific triage, ethical reforms, political priorities, or cost-cutting [4] [5] [6].
Conclusion — what can be stated with confidence
Based on the cited reporting, the one specific project clearly identified as having funding cut within the nearly $28 million total is the University of Pittsburgh monkey kidney-transplant study (about $1.4 million from NIAID), while other canceled grants are aggregated without named-institution detail in the material provided; separate but related reporting cites roughly $29 million in military contracts for painful dog-and-cat experiments identified by advocacy groups, but those figures are reported by different sources and should not be conflated without further documentation [1] [2].