I imagine there are animals who Senators Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul care about deeply â perhaps a dog or a cat. The truth is thereâs not much difference between these creatures and the more than a trillion aquatic and land animals we kill each year for human consumption. Thatâs why the senators should support federal funding for cultured-meat research. For readers who donât know, cultured meat is grown from animal cells, without slaughter. This revolutionary protein has already been granted regularity approval in Singapore. An Israeli company has reduced its production cost to $7.50 for a quarter pound of cultured chicken. Still, further development is necessary to make the price competitive with slaughtered meat.