Video Exposes Taxpayer-Funded Experimentation on Aborted Babies

A premature baby poses on February 20, 2003, his hand on his mother's in the neonatology d
DIDIER PALLAGES/AFP via Getty Images
Dr. Susan Berry

The Center for Medical Progress (CMP) Monday released a video (below) that asserts the National Institutes of Health (NIH) uses taxpayer funds to sponsor experimentation at the University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) on aborted babies obtained from a local Planned Parenthood facility.

Graphic Video Warning

“The University of Pittsburgh is a hub for some of the most barbaric experiments carried out on late-term aborted human infants,” the video’s narrator states, “experiments funded by the United States government, at the same time the university sponsors the local Planned Parenthood abortion business.”

CMP is the pro-life organization that, under project lead David Daleiden, conducted undercover investigations of Planned Parenthood’s alleged fetal tissue trafficking with biomedical procurement companies.

The video shows an image, published in 2020 by Pitt scientist Dr. Moses Bility and his colleagues, of humanized mouse and rat models. The narrator states the image “shows the scalps of five-month-old aborted babies grafted onto the backs of lab rats, growing the aborted babies’ hair on the rodents.”

The video then zooms in on the article by the Pitt scientists with the following description of the scalps highlighted: “full-thickness, human fetal skin was processed via removal of excess fat tissues attached to the subcutaneous layer of the skin.”

“How was this paid for?” the narrator asks in the video.

“With a nearly half a million-dollar research grant from Dr. Anthony Fauci’s NIAID [National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases] office at the NIH,” the narrator states.

The video then moves to a photo of a page from a 2012 journal article titled “Efficient Human Fetal/Liver Cell Isolation Protocol,” by Dr. Jorg Gerlach at Pitt’s McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine.

The video’s narrator states the protocol is “for harvesting the freshest, most pristine livers from five-month-old aborted babies in order to isolate massive numbers of stem cells for experimental transplantations into adults.”

The narrator states the next image is one of a “premature baby aborted alive via labor induction under surgical drapes with the umbilical cord off to one side as the baby is cut open to harvest the liver.”

“The Pitt scientists who invented this experiment received nearly $3 million from NIH,” the narrator adds.

The video then shows a diagram of NIH’s “All About Grants” podcasts which explains the agency’s grant application process, along with the crest for Pitt, and an image of a document titled “University of Pittsburgh as the GUDMAP [GenitoUrinary Development Molecular Anatomy Project] Tissue Hub and Collection Site.”

The narrator states Pitt received a multi-year $1.4 million grant from NIH making “Pitt a distribution hub for aborted fetal kidneys and other fetal body parts for NIH-funded projects across the country.”

The narrator then notes the projects presented in the video are “just a few of the recent fetal experimentation projects at Pitt,” and provides examples of how, over decades, Pitt researchers conducted experiments even on aborted babies delivered alive.

The video shows footage of what the narrator states are “experiments filmed in the 1950s by Pitt’s Dr. Davenport Hooker, who obtains live fetuses from abortions at Pitt’s hospital and tested their reflexes until they died.”

Next, the video moves to an image of a document appearing to be the testimony of a Pitt nurse, Mrs. Wilhamine Dick, who testified in 1972 before the Pennsylvania legislature.

“It was repulsive to watch live fetuses being packed in ice while still moving and trying to breathe, then being rushed to some laboratory,” the testimony in the video reads, “and hear a medical student later discuss the experience of examining various organs of a once-live baby.”

The video zooms in on this website focusing on Pitt’s Biospecimen Core (PBC). According to the site, the PBC:

… provides central support for University of Pittsburgh research programs needing tissue materials for research from patients seen at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC). The main objectives of the PBC are: (1) to provide a mechanism to simplify and streamline the process of research tissue accrual and disbursement, and (2) to provide efficient research pathology support services.

A section of the website titled “Prospective Tissue Collection and Banking” states:

We have developed an extensive infrastructure that positions us to obtain specimens for your research projects from surgical cases seen at the UPMC hospitals. Our staff members will work with you to determine your criteria and assist you to identify cases and obtain samples.

According to the video, “Two years ago, sources told CMP that Pittsburgh was one of the major hubs of the FBI’s investigation of Planned Parenthood’s involvement in the human trafficking of aborted fetuses.”

“This isn’t surprising because CMP undercover investigators were told previously by Planned Parenthood Western Pennsylvania abortion doctors who were on staff at Pitt that they supply the university’s tissue bank,” the narrator states.

The video then moves to one of CMP’s undercover investigation videos in which an alleged Planned Parenthood abortionist states, after being asked if they participated in specimen donation, “There’s a tissue bank, um, at Pitt that we offer patients to donate to.”

“So, then why is the University of Pittsburgh telling news media ‘There is no procurement relationship for tissue with Planned Parenthood,’” the narrator asks as the video moves to a document with that sentence highlighted.

The video then shows an image of the website of Pitt’s Ryan Residency Program, which states Pitt’s Magee-Womens Hospital:

… remains a leader in family planning training with a dedicated family planning rotation since 2005 … The curriculum aims to cover a full spectrum of reproductive health care including complex contraception, pregnancy loss, and abortion with an emphasis on evidence-based practices and truly patient-centered counseling.

The website’s description continues:

Residents work with specialists in multiple settings including the Magee Outpatient Clinic, the Center for Contraception and Family Planning at UPMC Magee-Womens Hospital, the operating room, and a freestanding abortion facility (Planned Parenthood of Western Pennsylvania). Through these environments, residents gain an appreciation for complex and nuanced counseling regarding contraception and pregnancy options and improve procedural skills in ultrasonography, D&C and D&E procedures, and long-acting reversible contraception placement/removals.

The video points out Dr. Jennefer Russo, an alumna of the Pitt abortion training program, is now vice president and medical director of Planned Parenthood Orange and San Bernardino counties.

“She supplied the aborted fetuses to the criminal company DaVinci Biosciences, which admitted to illegally selling the fetal body parts and was shut down by local law enforcement,” the narrator continues.

In December 2017, DaVinci Biosciences and its sister company DV Biologics reached a $7.8 million settlement with the Orange County, California, district attorney’s office requiring them to permanently close their operations in the state, to admit liability, and to pay $195,000 in civil penalties.

The video provides additional examples of Planned Parenthood officials and abortionists with ties to Pitt.

The video then shows an image of page 20 of Pitt’s 2020 Department of OB/GYN Annual Report, containing the section titled “Outreach/contracted care.”

The document shows Planned Parenthood of Western Pennsylvania is listed as a contracted care site for Pitt.

The video ends by drawing the following conclusions “just from the publicly available sources”:

  1. Planned Parenthood abortionists supply the aborted fetuses to Pitt
  2. Pitt uses its access to the fetuses to get major NIH grant money
  3. Pitt sends major kickbacks and medical resources back to Planned Parenthood

“It all starts to look suspiciously like an illegal quid pro quo over aborted fetal organs and body parts, all funded by taxpayers,” the narrator concludes.

In mid-April, the Biden-Harris administration’s Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced it would reverse the Trump administration’s decision to end taxpayer funding for experimental research with fetal tissue derived from aborted babies.

NIH, an agency under the authority of HHS, announced an “Update on Changes to NIH Requirements Regarding Proposed Human Fetal Tissue Research.”

Specifically, the notice announced the reversal of the Trump administration’s decision to eliminate aborted fetal tissue research supported by taxpayer dollars and, secondly, the end of the Trump administration’s Ethics Advisory Board that reviewed all research applications for NIH grants and contracts from outside the government that proposed the use of aborted babies.

“We believe that we have to do the research that it takes to make sure that we’re incorporating innovation and getting all of those types of treatments and therapies out there to the American people,” HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra said, apparently under the impression aborted fetuses are required to invent medical treatments.

As AFP reported, in March 2020, Becerra, the former attorney general of California, organized a coalition of attorneys general from 14 other states to lift the Trump administration’s ban on taxpayer-funded fetal tissue research under the guise tissue from aborted babies would be required to develop vaccines for the coronavirus.

Dr. Tara Sander Lee, senior fellow and director of life sciences at the pro-life Charlotte Lozier Institute, said in a statement the Biden-Harris administration’s “decision to resume experiments using the body parts of aborted children defies both the best ethics and most promising science”:

Exploiting the bodies of these young human beings is unnecessary and grotesque. Fetal tissue was not, and has never been, used for polio or any other vaccine, nor to produce or manufacture any pharmaceutical. There are superior and ethical alternatives available such as adult stem cell models being used by countless scientists worldwide to develop and produce advanced medicines treating patients now, without exploitation of any innocent life. All scientists should reject the administration’s attempts to prey on fears related to the pandemic to advance the practice of harvesting fetal tissue.

In April, legal watchdog organization Judicial Watch provided a nearly 600-page report with uncovered emails of conversations between Food and Drug Administration (FDA) employees and the California-based biomedical company Advanced Bioscience Resources (ABR). The emails revealed the U.S. government had been buying and trafficking “fresh” aborted baby body parts.

According to the report, the FDA purchased the body parts, which were derived from babies aborted at up to 24-weeks’ gestation, to engineer humanized mice and perform experimental drug research.

Records from Judicial Watch indicate ABR received $12,000 per aborted baby, including some between the gestational ages of 16-24 weeks. Many of the purchase orders are for “fresh,” intact thymuses and livers, shipped “on wet ice.”

Daleiden testified Tuesday at the Pennsylvania House of Representatives Health Committee hearing on “Fetal Experimentation.” The University of Pittsburgh’s Dean of the School of Medicine, Dr. Anantha Shekhar, was also expected to testify.

Breitbart News reached out to Planned Parenthood Western Pennsylvania for comment. The Planned Parenthood affiliate CEOs said in a statement, “These accusations about Planned Parenthood of Western Pennsylvania are false, period.”

The statement said, “There are three Planned Parenthood affiliates in Pennsylvania and none of them participate in fetal tissue donation,” adding, “Today’s hearing was one piece of an aggressive anti-abortion agenda pushed by politicians here in Pennsylvania and across the country to do one thing — ban abortion outright.”

The abortion providers stated:

David Daleiden’s accusations have been widely discredited by the media and multiple state and federal investigations. He is currently facing felony charges and has been ordered to pay millions of dollars in damages to Planned Parenthood for his actions illegally recording abortion providers and others, after a federal jury found him liable for breaking multiple state and federal laws.

In December, U.S. District Judge William Orrick III ordered Daleiden and his CMP associates to pay $13.6 million in addition to $2 million in damages for recording the abortion provider’s officials while they appeared to be discussing how they harvest the body parts of aborted babies for transfer.

In November 2019, a jury found the pro-life journalists violated the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), causing significant harm to Planned Parenthood with its video series, and awarded the punitive damages to the abortion provider.

Daleiden told SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Tonight soon afterward, Orrick “is actually the founder of a Planned Parenthood of Northern California clinic in San Francisco.”

In addition, Orrick’s wife’s Facebook account was found to post public comments — along with a photo of her and her husband — that indicated support for Planned Parenthood and criticism of Daleiden and CMP.

The judge blocked the jury from viewing all the undercover video he produced during his undercover investigation, Daleiden noted.

Daleiden’s appeal of the lawsuit brought by Planned Parenthood drew amicus briefs in March, filed by 20 state attorneys general and animal rights activist groups such as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), in support of the First Amendment rights of undercover investigators.

The 20 attorneys general said in the summary of their argument:

The district court granted Plaintiffs’ motion for summary judgment against Defendants’ public policy defense in its totality. The district court relied extensively on its assertion that the CMP Videos contain “no evidence of actual criminal wrongdoing.” That not only is incorrect on its own merits but also employs the wrong test. The public policy defense is applicable to the claims presented, and its appropriate adjudication must assess the substantial law enforcement and policy consequences of the release of the CMP Videos.

Meanwhile, the University of Pittsburgh chapter of Students for Life of America is planning a protest on Friday after viewing the CMP video.

“Dr. Anthony Fauci should be ashamed to be affiliated with this kind of Dr. Frankenstein ‘research,’ taking babies born during abortions only to be cut up and sold for parts,” said SFLA president Kristan Hawkins. “Today’s video shows the horrifying realities of ongoing research that attempts to profit off the death of the innocents.”

Hawkins added, “what’s even more offensive about the information out today is that ethical research without aborted infant tissue has been found more effective.”

“The details of this gruesome research illustrate why it’s also important for the federal government to put an end to this unethical practice, paid for by U.S. tax dollars,” she said.

Pitt Students for Life President Anna Schanne said her group is “deeply disappointed.”

“The University of Pittsburgh should not align themselves with Planned Parenthood,” she said. “Especially, as a public university, it is disgusting that taxpayer money be used on morally and ethically problematic research. It is deeply horrifying to know that we walk on the campus and pass the buildings that use aborted children from Planned Parenthood for research.”

Pitt alumna, former SFLA president, and current research student Elena Liguori added, “The University of Pittsburgh has the power and the resources to use medicine to help people in wonderful ways and does this often.”

“However, medicine should never come at a cost of the most vulnerable, particularly the unborn,” she added. “With rapid advances in the capabilities of medicine and science, we must be sure to ask ourselves not only what is possible, but first and foremost what is right and ethical.”

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