The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has terminated the contract between the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Advanced Bioscience Resources (ABR) which would have used taxpayer dollars to fund the use of aborted fetal tissue for research.

National and state pro-life leaders recently sent a letter to HHS Secretary Alex Azar urging the government to end the taxpayer-funded use of aborted fetal tissue for research. The letter read, in part: “We were shocked and dismayed at the news report that the FDA has signed a contract to purchase ‘fresh’ aborted fetal organs from ABR, for the purpose of creating humanized mice with human immune systems.

According to GSA’s federal contract database, the FDA signed a contract on July 25 with ABR to acquire “fresh” organs from aborted babies to implant them into mice. The taxpayer-funded project includes paying nearly $16,000 to ABR for harvested organs, even though the organization remains under investigation by the Department of Justice.

HHS is now conducting an audit of all acquisitions involving human fetal tissue to ensure conformity with procurement and human fetal tissue research laws and regulations urging the government to end the taxpayer-funded use of aborted fetal tissue for research. 

HHS issued a statement which read: “After a recent review of a contract between Advanced Bioscience Resources, Inc. and the Food and Drug Administration to provide human fetal tissue to develop testing protocols, HHS was not sufficiently assured that the contract included the appropriate protections applicable to fetal tissue research or met all other procurement requirements. As a result, that contract has been terminated, and HHS is now conducting an audit of all acquisitions involving human fetal tissue to ensure conformity with procurement and human fetal tissue research laws and regulations. In addition, HHS has initiated a comprehensive review of all research involving fetal tissue to ensure consistency with statutes and regulations governing such research, and to ensure the adequacy of procedures and oversight of this research in light of the serious regulatory, moral, and ethical considerations involved. Finally, HHS is continuing to review whether adequate alternatives exist to the use of human fetal tissue in HHS funded research and will ensure that efforts to develop such alternatives are funded and accelerated.”

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