Taxpayers may have unwittingly funded the same "wet markets" and laboratory in China that lawmakers are turning their attention to during the coronavirus pandemic.

A watchdog group issued a report finding that as recently as 2015, the Department of Agriculture purchased live animals, such as cats and dogs, with U.S. tax dollars at Chinese meat markets similar to the one in Wuhan, which has been tied to early cases of COVID-19. The department also allegedly paid for the animals to be slaughtered and transported back to the United States for experiments in which their remains were fed to other animals.

One study involved feeding the body parts of euthanized cats from the markets to kittens, according to taxpayer watchdog White Coat Waste Project, which dubbed the project "kitten cannibalism." The experiments were intended as part of the department's research on a parasite that causes the foodborne illness toxoplasmosis, which cost $22 million over several years before getting shut down in 2019.

Summaries of such research indicated that 34 live cats were purchased from China in 2006, killed, and delivered to a USDA laboratory in Maryland and that another 42 were bought in the country in 2014 before being slaughtered and sent to the same laboratory.

The USDA pushed back on the watchdog report, denying to the Washington Examiner that it purchased live animals from Chinese meat markets.

"USDA never purchased live animals, including cats and dogs, from Chinese meat markets. USDA did not purchase any feline specimens from wet markets in Wuhan, China. USDA’s last purchase of feline specimens from China was in 2006 at the Changban Free Market in Guangzhou, Guangdong province," a USDA representative said.

"USDA did not pay for any animals to be slaughtered for research at Chinese meat markets. USDA only purchased feline specimens that were slaughtered by Chinese market vendors for food in accordance with People’s Republic of China laws," the spokesperson added, a claim White Coat Waste Project called "deceptive" due to a lack of national laws protecting animals slaughtered for food in China.

Congress has since turned its attention to "wet markets" as the world continues to combat the coronavirus. A bipartisan group of lawmakers on Wednesday called on the world’s leading health groups to push for a global ban on the markets, which have reportedly reopened in China, over concerns that the coronavirus may have come "from a zoonotic source" in Wuhan.

"In order to help prevent the next pandemic, we write today to urge your organizations to take aggressive action toward a global shut down of live wildlife markets and a ban on the international trade of live wildlife that is not intended for conservation purposes,” the group wrote.

Some members of Congress have also speculated the novel coronavirus originated from an accidental lab escape from China's biosafety level 4 superlaboratory that the U.S. government also funded.

The National Institutes of Health has authorized two animal testing labs at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which researches human infectious diseases just a few miles from the local market, to receive tax dollars for animal experiments. Some of this research included coronavirus studies involving bats that some legislators have theorized could have been a catalyst for the outbreak.

The agency has authorized another 22 taxpayer-funded animal experiments at other laboratories in China, and reports have indicated that experimental animals from some of these facilities have been sold after use to "wet markets" for consumption.

"Uncle Sam went on a spending spree with Americans’ hard-earned tax dollars at China's despicable 'wet markets,' where scientists believe COVID-19 originated, and is still forcing U.S. taxpayers to subsidize animal abuse at China’s controversial animal testing labs that may even sell abused and infected animals to wet markets," Anthony Bellotti, founder and president of the White Coat Waste Project, told the Washington Examiner.

“When I learned our government was spending taxpayers' money at China's disgusting wet markets to buy and slaughter cats and dogs for cruel experiments, I helped lead the successful effort to stop it last year," said Rep. Matt Gaetz, who was instrumental in ending the USDA's kitten experiments, in a statement.

"I'm disgusted now to learn that, for years, the U.S. government has been funding dangerous and cruel animal experiments at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which may have contributed to the global spread of coronavirus, and research at other labs in China that have virtually no oversight from U.S. authorities," the Florida Republican continued. "It's unnecessary and unacceptable for American taxpayers to fund these institutions, and it has to end now."

"The wet markets in China are disgusting, and to think that, just recently, taxpayer dollars were spent to purchase animals from these markets for cruel experiments is insane," added Rep. Brian Mast, another Florida Republican who worked to stop the USDA's tests. "That’s why we fought so hard to end this practice, and we will continue fighting to make sure taxpayer dollars never go to these disgusting markets again."

The NIH did not respond to a request for comment.

Editor's note: This story has been updated to stress the report findings about tax-payer dollars being used at Chinese "wet" markets come from a watchdog group and to include more of the USDA's denial that it purchased live animals at any such markets.