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The Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement has attracted a wide range of Americans for a variety of reasons but, most recently, one of the nation’s foremost animal rights groups, PETA, has teamed up with the Trump administration and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to push one of its latest initiatives.
Last week, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced it would spend $87 million on a new Standardized Organoid Modeling (SOM) Center, which will research alternative methods to reduce scientists’ reliance on animals for biomedical research testing. The initiative also includes policies to support the rehousing of animals used in scientific research.
“We’ve been working with NIH to give them background information on areas of disease research where the animal experiments have failed so tremendously, and there’s the most potential to really shift the game over to human-relevant methods,” Emily Trunnell, director of science advancement and outreach at People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), told Fox News Digital. “About a month ago, we sent them these seven horrific grants … anybody could look at the things they’re doing to like monkeys and dogs and just be like, there’s no way taxpayers need to be funding this. So we continue to push them in that way. We are supportive and providing help where we’re asked, and we do think they’re going in the right direction.”
BEN CARSON SWORN IN AS NATIONAL NUTRITION ADVISOR
HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., center, and USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins, right, talk with members of the Foot of the Mountain Farm, a vendor at the inaugural Great American Farmers Market on the National Mall held on Monday, Aug. 4, 2025. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
The issue of using animals in biomedical research is also one championed by the White Coat Waste Project, which was a vehement critic of Dr. Anthony Fauci and the Biden administration…
