A shocking new exposé by White Coat Waste (WCW) has revealed horrifying government-funded experiments taking place at the State University of New York’s (SUNY) Upstate Medical School, where baby rabbits are bred to endure agonizing seizures and die—all while being videotaped by researchers.
According to government records obtained by WCW through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) has spent $1,108,102 on a controversial project designed to create rabbits genetically predisposed to experience Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy (SUDEP). The NIH-funded experiment plans to breed and experiment on 230 rabbits, none of whom will live beyond nine months.
In one particularly disturbing video uncovered by WCW, a two-week-old rabbit, connected to electrodes, convulses violently before dying as researchers record her final moments.
NIH-funded experimenters are using CRISPR genetic engineering to produce “mutant rabbits” that suffer from uncontrollable seizures, cardiac failure, and sudden death. Some of the animals are subjected to drug injections, flashing light exposure, and forced hyperventilation to intentionally trigger seizures for data collection.
Adding insult to injury, SUNY’s NIH grant application shockingly states, regarding the animals, “We do not anticipate any pain or distress.”
Despite those claims, SUNY’s rabbit testing lab was cited by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) in July 2024 for failing to account for and seek alternatives to the “distressful and harmful procedural events” associated with inducing seizures.
The USDA inspection report stated: “The protocol prescribes multiple methods of seizure induction to mirror real-world triggers, including hyperventilation and photic stimulation. Both methods of induction are potentially distressing, evidenced in part by their utilization to induce seizures. Seizure induction, and the induction methods themselves, are not addressed in the protocol’s search for alternatives.”
The NIH extended the lab’s funding by an additional $405,000 in April 2025, with the project now scheduled to conclude on August 31, 2026.
SUNY researchers reported in their NIH filings that they have already documented multiple “spontaneous sudden deaths” among their genetically altered rabbits, and that the animals are kept under constant infrared video surveillance to record seizures and fatal convulsions in “near-real time.”
“White Coat Waste’s new investigation exposes how the NIH is paying heartless experimenters to engineer bunnies to drop dead from seizures and videotape their violent deaths. Taxpayers shouldn’t be forced to bankroll this barbaric abuse of baby rabbits—gentle animals that millions of Americans cherish as beloved pets and family members,” said Kailey Mauro, a WCW research and investigations associate with a master’s degree in animal science and behavior.
WCW has previously exposed other cruel NIH-funded programs that breed sick and deformed dogs and cats for use in cruel experiments.
TAKE ACTION! Sign the White Coat Waste Project’s petition to join thousands of taxpayers demanding an end to wasteful and cruel experiments on animals in government labs HERE!
