Mehmet Oz is facing accusations of animal abuse tied to medical research. Here’s what you need to know – The Morning Call

Mehmet Oz, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania, is facing accusations over his treatment of animals following a report that dozens of his experiments at Columbia University resulted in the deaths of hundreds of dogs.

The issue went viral after Jezebel published a report Monday about Ozs time at the Columbia University Institute of Comparative Medicine labs, where he served as a principal investigator for a number of years. Between 1989 and 2010, he published the results of 75 experiments that involved 1,027 animals.

Of those experiments, at least 34 killed about 329 dogs, two killed 31 pigs, and 38 killed 661 rabbits and other rodents, Jezebel reported.

Questions over treatment of animals in research that Oz oversaw at Columbia date back to the early 2000s, when the animal rights organization People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals detailed allegations from a whistleblower. The USDA eventually ordered Columbia to pay a $2,000 penalty for violations of the Animal Welfare Act as part of a settlement.

And this isnt the first time the allegations against Oz, a celebrity doctor, have popped up on the campaign trail. In September, Billy Penn published an investigation into Ozs time at Columbia, as well as the fallout over the experiments.

An Oz spokesperson called the Jezebel story preposterous, and said Oz was not present during the research and does not condone the mistreatment of animals.

Here is what you need to know about the allegations and Ozs role in the research:

Oz oversaw studies involving animals that focused on cardiac functions, ailments, and surgical procedures.

Whistleblower Catherine DellOrto, a postdoctoral veterinary fellow at the school, went public in the early 2000s about research at the university, saying that it inflicted needless suffering on research animals. PETA detailed some of the allegations in letters to the USDA and Columbia in 2003 and 2004, saying experiments by Oz and other researchers included serious violations of the Animal Welfare Act.

In one letter from 2003, then-director of PETAs research and investigations department Mary Beth Sweetland detailed an incident in which a litter of fully conscious puppies was placed in a plastic bag and killed with an expired euthanasia drug.

The puppies cried out as they received the IC injection because it is, of course, very painful and should not be done without first anesthetizing animals, Sweetland wrote.

Ozs name, however, did not appear in PETAs letters until 2004, when Columbia and the USDA agreed to a $2,000 settlement in connection with animal abuse allegations. That settlement came following an internal investigation by Columbia.

The settlement agreement detailed a number of findings, two dealing with dogs. In one, pups whelped from a dog being used in a research study were euthanized with outdated euthanasia solution and were not properly sedated at the time. Another finding notes that a dog exercise plan does not provide evidence that plan is approved by the attending veterinarian. Other findings deal with primate enclosures, facility conditions, and procedures for evaluating pain and discomfort in animals.

After the allegations began spreading online last month, at least one viral tweet indicated that Oz pumped injections into puppies hearts without sedation. However, The Inquirer was unable to find documentation from the time of the experiments that Oz himself euthanized any of the dogs.

DellOrto corroborated as much in an interview with Billy Penn, saying that it wasnt him that did the euthanasia of the puppies. Billy Penn also noted that administering euthanasia is rarely, if ever, left to department leaders or directors.

Despite the lack of evidence that Oz personally mistreated dogs, animal rights activists still believe he bears responsibility.

As principal investigator, Oz was tasked with undertaking full scientific, administrative, and fiscal responsibility for the conduct of his studies, according to the schools animal research handbook. But an Oz campaign spokesperson told The Inquirer that Oz was not alerted to any issues until after the cases were finished, and was not present for operations or treatments on animals.

It does not appear that anyone from [Columbias Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee] actually bothered to inspect the dogs used in Ozs experiments despite the invasiveness of the experiments and the strong potential for suffering, Sweetland wrote in a 2004 letter to the USDA. She added that the USDA ought to require that Columbia University suspend all further use of animals by Dr. Mehmet Oz.

DellOrto echoed a similar sentiment to Billy Penn, saying that when your name is on the experiment, and the way the experiment is designed inflicts such cruelty to these animals, by design, theres a problem.

DellOrto, Sweetlands letter says, took her concerns to then-head veterinarian Sulli Popilskis, who allegedly told her: You still dont understand do you? Its all political.

Popilskis, meanwhile, reportedly told Billy Penn last month that PETA isnt a reliable source.

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Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, the Democratic nominee for Senate, seized on the controversy, tweeting on Monday that some sick people like Dr. Oz get their jollies by harming animals, and called Oz a puppy killer. Fetterman also shared a photo with his rescue dogs Levi and Artie, writing that he would be hugging them extra tight tonight.

The Fetterman campaign also called Oz a puppy killer in a Monday news release. Fettermans wife, Gisele Barreto Fetterman, called the Jezebel article a truly heartbreaking report.

Ozs campaign denied the allegations in a statement to The Inquirer on Tuesday, and accused Fetterman of using the viral story to distract from other issues.

While Dr. Oz was busy operating on human lives, researchers and veterinarians were in the Columbia University research labs finding new approaches to treat patients with atrial fibrillation which impacts millions of Americans including John Fetterman, said Oz spokesperson Brittany Yanick. Dr. Oz was not in the operating room when the operations were done, he wasnt present during the post op treatments, no one alerted him of the problem until after the cases were finished and he does not condone the mistreatment of animals.

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Mehmet Oz is facing accusations of animal abuse tied to medical research. Here's what you need to know - The Morning Call