After questions from California members of Congress, the West Los Angeles Veterans Affairs Medical Center has halted planned tests on narcoleptic dogs. In a May letter to the Veterans Affairs inspector general, U.S. Rep. Dina Titus (D-Nev.) and eight members of Los Angeles' congressional delegation demanded to know more about the experiment, including how much it could cost and what other experiments the Los Angeles VA was conducting on animals. "A research proposal for breeding and studying these dogs was approved through VA’s Merit Review and the national Office of Research and Development recently," the VA said in a statement to the members of Congress. Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Torrance), one of the members who sent the May letter, said he is relieved the experiments have ended. “This much needed reform will put the Los Angeles VA back on track to taking care of our veterans without wasting resources to conduct unnecessary and inhumane experiments on dogs,” Lieu said in a statement.

Source: Los Angeles Times June 13, 2017 17:43 UTC