- A new White Coat Waste (WCW) investigation exposes $779,689 in new NIH funding under Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for an animal experimentation collaboration with a Russian lab that has conducted plague research with the Siberian facility at the center of a deadly lab leak controversy.
- Federal spending records and documents exclusively obtained by WCW show how, as recently as September 2026, RFK’s NIH renewed funding for University of Illinois animal experiments conducted in cooperation with Russia’s Institute of Cytology and Genetics (ICG) in Siberia.
- Records show the state-run ICG has specifically collaborated on plague research with the now-infamous Irkutsk Anti-Plague Institute, where a lab worker’s recent death has sparked concerns of another lab leak and cover-up.
- RFK’s NIH has twice renewed taxpayer funding for this collaboration with a Siberian animal lab — even after the Biden administration cut off research collaborations with Russia following a WCW investigation in 2022.
- WCW was the very first to expose how Dr. Fauci funded the Wuhan lab in 2020, and the first to show how NIH continued to fund and cover-up dangerous virus experiments at the Rocky Mountain Laboratory, along with other setbacks for animals under RFK.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s department funneled nearly $800,000 into a research project tied to a Russian lab at the center of a chilling plague mystery. Federal records obtained by the watchdog group White Coat Waste show that the latest grants landed just weeks ago, just before the death of a worker at the Siberian facility sparked widespread panic.
— The Daily Beast, October 8, 2026
The death of a worker from a gain-of-function animal lab in Siberia has sparked a U.S. government response and global concerns about a possible plague lab leak.
According to a new investigation by animal testing watchdog White Coat Waste (WCW), the National Institutes of Health awarded $779,689 to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 2025 and 2026 for research conducted in partnership with Russia’s state-run Institute of Cytology and Genetics.
— Mediaite, October 7, 2026
Now, WCW exposes how RFK is actively funding an animal experimentation collaboration with a Russian lab that has conducted plague research with the Siberian facility at the center of the lab leak controversy.
It came to White Coat Waste’s attention because the researchers kill the animals before sending samples to the university for further analysis.
— Daily Mail, October 8, 2026
Federal spending records and documents exclusively obtained by WCW through the Freedom of Information Act show that $779,689 in funding was doled out to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign for a collaboration with the government-run Institute of Cytology and Genetics (ICG) of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Novosibirsk, Siberia.
RFK’s NIH paid out $389,746 in new funding to the Russian collaboration in September 2026, and $389,943 in July 2025.
Records show that ICG has collaborated with the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Research Institute of Siberia, the same lab where a worker was reportedly infected with pneumonic plague and later died.
Exhibit A: USASpending record showing disbursements to the UI lab under the NIH grant funding the collaboration with the Institute of Cytology and Genetics (ICG) of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Exhibit B: Excerpt from NIH RePORTER of the NIH grant abstract showing the collaboration with the Institute of Cytology and Genetics (ICG) of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
The current NIH grant for the U.S.-Siberia collaboration — which WCW exposed for the very first time in 2023 — funds brain experiments on foxes bred at the Siberian experimental fur farm.
The foxes are killed by an overdose and their brain tissues are shipped to the U.S. for further testing.
Exhibit C: Excerpts from NIH grant records obtained via FOIA, showing fox samples are obtained from a Russian lab and sent to the U.S.
In early 2020, WCW first alerted the Trump White House about NIH funding flowing to Russian government animal testing labs, including ICG.
Our years-long Worldwide Waste campaign subsequently uncovered U.S. taxpayer-funded experiments on kittens in Saint Petersburg, culminating in the end of all NIH funding for all Russian animal labs.
Following WCW’s landmark investigation and bipartisan pressure generated by our lobbying campaign, the Biden White House also issued rules in 2022 cutting research collaborations with Russia:
Consistent with U.S. domestic and international law, we will wind down institutional, administrative, funding, and personnel relationships and research collaborations in the fields of science and technology with Russian government-affiliated research institutions and individuals who continue to be employed by or work under the direction of those institutions.
WCW has also been leading efforts to permanently prohibit funding for animal labs in Russia, China, and other adversarial nations with the AFAR Act, Farm Bill, and other legislation.
Apparently, RFK never got the memo.
WCW has exposed how RFK has continued to fund dangerous virus experiments on animals at NIH’s Rocky Mountain Laboratory and other facilities around the world.
And it’s hardly the only post-Biden setback for animals at RFK’s NIH.
WCW’s MAHA Betrayed investigation documents more than $225 million in new NIH spending on dog and cat experiments since RFK took office.
After Fauci’s gain-of-function disaster in Wuhan, it is unjustifiable for RFK to renew funding for an animal testing collaboration with another foreign adversary.
The solution is simple:
