CLEVELAND — A program in Cleveland designed to help improve the health of our wounded veterans is getting a closer look.
The Louis Stokes VA Medical Center is one of the last sites in the country still performing tests on dogs.
Right now, an investigation is underway into the agency's continued use of those controversial experiments.
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are joining forces to ban taxpayer-funded experiments on dogs.
The move comes as they launch an investigation into whether those tests got the green light without approval by the former VA secretary as required by law.
"They're going to suffer significant pain or distress as a result of that experimentation," said Sharon Harvey with the Cleveland APL.
A state representative from Nevada is also reintroducing legislation to prevent what she calls unkind and painful procedures and experiments on animals.
It encourages the current VA secretary to work with Congress to find other alternatives.
"We have alternatives that can offer researchers very similar results in doing the studies that don't involve the suffering or the loss of life of animals," said Harvey.
The White Coat Waste Project, a group opposed to using your tax money to fund animal experiments, said the Cleveland VA Medical Center spent more than $42,000 to preorder seven shipments of hound puppies just days after Congress cut funding for the VA testing.
"There was a bill that made it through last year that did require there be additional approvals for these types of experiments, but unfortunately that's just turning out to not be enough," said Harvey.
The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs is standing by its testing track record.
The agency told News 5 that vets with spinal cord injuries are now breathing on their own and can cough effectively due to the canine studies they've conducted.
The study will remain active in Cleveland until it's complete in the next few months.
