While the country enjoyed its annual celebration of the Super Bowl, the U.S. biomedical research sector was stabbed in the back.

Late last week, Trump slashed billions in funding overnight with no planning or consultations with researchers, doctors, or hospitals. The impact will be catastrophic for biomedical research: labs will shut down, clinical trials could get cancelled, and hospital staff fired.

What did they actually do?

The Trump Administration announced they would cap the amount of overhead that the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the largest funder of biomedical research in the world, is allowed to issue in research grants at 15%. Historically, the NIH has paid up to the ~50% range. If it goes through, this change would amount to a near immediate loss of billions of dollars to hospitals and universities, many in red states that voted for Trump.

So what do overhead costs cover? It’s estimated that for every dollar spent on planning and conducting  research, another is needed for facility and support staff costs.  Meaning, overhead pays for literally everything necessary for a lab to actually DO the research. This includes:

• Buildings  costs
• Advanced equipment & infrastructure
• Utility costs
• Health insurance & benefits

NIH funding also supports about 412,000 jobs, from research assistants to grant managers to people who dispose of toxic chemicals.

All of this is labeled by Musk and his goons as unnecessary waste as they continue their ill conceived rampage against the federal government and a strong American future.

The message is clear and destabilizing to the scientific ecosystem:  Your work is not valued. Your job is expendable. Patients don’t need new treatments.

Now is the time to inform and act — because the average person will not feel the near-term impact. But when the pipeline for new discoveries and new life-saving medications dries up, and America loses its position as the leader in biomedical innovation — we’ll ask “How did we let this happen??” 

The NIH is the engine that powers US medical innovation: long-term research with decades long horizons that companies and investors will never fund. Our economy gets a solid payback on this research — measurable in dollars, and immeasurable in lives.

For every $1 spent on NIH research, $2.46 flows back into our economy (Link1, Link2). Not to mention the taxes paid by a $1 Trillion biopharma and medical research industry. 

The discoveries made in these labs become tomorrow’s life-saving treatments. With healthcare costs spiraling, it is pennywise, pound foolish to slash research. 

Examples originating from the NIH: 

• Cardiovascular disease: Advances in hypertension and cholesterol management reduced heart attack and stroke rates, saving $100s of billions. 
• Cancer: research in precision medicine and immunotherapy has led to higher survival rates. Without foundational NIH funding, cancer immunotherapies wouldn’t exist.  
• So many more!

Musk dares to call long-term investments in the fight against cancer a WASTE?

NIH’s indirect costs average (28%) and are in-line with private biotechs (25%-50%) and defense contractor overhead (10-100%) —  spending on facilities, equipment, infrastructure, benefits, project management, administration, etc.

Should we have oversight to ensure appropriate spending? Of course. But Musk’s surprise nuclear bomb is the WRONG way to approach this!

The NIH budget is:  

• Less than 1% of the federal budget and <1% of healthcare spending in the US. 
• 2.4% of the cost of the F-35 Joint Strike fighter program. 
• Around the cost of a couple aircraft carriers 

US long-term innovation is fueled by grants, and is the basis for our future economy (e.g. Internet, human genome, etc). The US has been the world’s beacon for medical research, attracting top talent and driving innovation. We’re about to dim that light. China just surpassed the US in annual research publications — in the race for global dominance in medical research, these NIH cuts are like shooting researchers in the leg.

What do you value? For me, health research that saves lives ranks near the top. Do you agree? Speak. Up. Now. Lives depend on it.