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© Oxford University Press 2006.
NEWS |
NIH, Related Agencies Face Flat Budget Future
Small cuts to federal cancer funding have already made a mark on academic research, and bigger cuts may be ahead.
Since the doubling of the National Institutes of Health budget between 1997 and 2003, NIH funding has remained relatively flat. After a 1% across-the-board cut, NIH's budget of $28.6 billion for fiscal year 2006 is less than the budget for fiscal year 2005, marking the first time in 36 years that federal support for medical research has fallen in absolute dollar amount.
More cuts may be ahead. While the president's proposed budget for fiscal year 2007 calls for another year of flat funding at NIH, nearly all the institutes would see small decreases in funding levels.
"The budget request reflects the tough choices that had to be made to best preserve our investment in biomedical research and to support research for medical advancements that will improve the length and quality of human life," said John Burklow, associate director for NIH communications.
Under the proposal, most of the institutes would receive a small reduction to their budgets compared with this year. The National Cancer Institute takes the largest hit in absolute dollars, with a proposed $40 million reduction. After that cut, NCI would receive $4.75 billion in 2007, down from $4.79 billion this year and $4.82 billion in 2005.
"At a time when we are reaping the return on our sustained investments in the fight against cancer with continuing declines in death rates, we should be accelerating our investments and progress, not retreating from our commitment," said Daniel E. Smith, vice president of government relations for the American Cancer Society.
"Despite advancements made from past investments and extraordinary opportunities that now exist ... policymakers are inexplicably changing their tune," he said.
Even with flat funding in 2005 and 2006, NCI has had to make cutbacks to research grants. The institute released a new funding policy at the end of January indicating that the top 11% of research grants will be funded this year. By comparison, the top 16% were funded last year and just a few years ago, NCI funded the top 20% of research.
Officials say that the more limited funding policy reflects a combination of an increasing number of grant applications, which were up 7% between 2004 and 2005, and a decrease in available dollars. In 2004, NCI funded nearly 1,500 standard projects, the largest number ever. In 2005, such grants dropped to just under 1,300.
Under the new policy, grants that are approved will get 29% less money than requested.
The impact of the budget cuts goes beyond simple academic research, said Wendy Selig, vice president of legislative affairs for the American Cancer Society. With the help of generous funding, researchers have been able to greatly advance the efficacy of standard treatments for common cancers such as breast and colon cancer. However, when it comes to rarer forms of cancer, the best treatment option is often experimental drugs and protocols. For these patients, many of whom are children, the hope for treatment in the experimental setting will dry up along with diminishing research dollars, she said.
The University of Tennessee's Statewide Cancer Institute seems a case in point.
The plan was to raise the level of cancer care and clinical research in Tennessee and surrounding states through a new network of medical centers. Just last year, the university seemed well on the way to raising the $28 million needed to launch the centers across the state. However, with federal funding drying up, the plan has been put on hold, said Gabor Tigyi, M.D., Ph.D., professor at the UT Health Sciences Center in Memphis.
"We are newcomers to this game, so we are the most vulnerable to funding shortfalls," he said.
The cuts to NCI funding levels have also caused problems with ongoing research projects, said Tigyi. For 2006, NCI has reduced funding for ongoing studies by 2.35%. "I have three grants, that's about $5,000 each. That's a lot of money. We will have to curtail our experimental design. The last thing we want to do is cut staff or salary," he said.
Tigyi also worries about getting established studies renewed given the increased competition. "I have a study that will need to be renewed soon. It is producing more data the longer it goes, but I don't know whether it will get funded again even though it had a very [good] priority score originally," he said.
Even if it does, Tigyi says he expects NCI will impose a 10% "administrative" reduction on the grant. "It's the unpredictability ... that hurts us the most," he said. That unpredictability is also discouraging young researchers from entering the field of medical research, experts said.
The proposed NIH budget includes $15 million for a new program that will provide increased support to encourage new investigators to enter the field.
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