Trump Is Apparently Pro-Parkinson's and Pro-Infectious Disease

 The National Institutes of Health is the largest funder of biomedical research in the world.  It has a remarkable list of accomplishments that has saved millions of lives including development of vaccines for hepatitis, HPV and polio, treatments for HIV/AIDS, cancer and Alzheimer's, and the  development of the MRI machine.  It also plays an important part of our economy--its basic research very commonly results in hugely profitable drugs and medical devices.

Given this history of success--that affects every American--NIH has benefitted from bipartisan support.  Its budgets have done well in both Republican and Democratic Administrations.  Until now.

Through a series of actions--the most dramatic occurring yesterday--the Trump Administration has gutted NIH.

• As I reported in a previous post, the Trump Administration has announced a new rule about reimbursement of indirect research costs that will have a devastating impact of the U.S. biomedical lab infrastructure.  Universities are already reducing the number of graduate students in biomedical fields,  The University of Pennsylvania has stopped doctoral admissions altogether.  
• The NIH has cancelled or suspended hundreds of research projects, including more than 100 clinical trials that may be forced to halt.  
• Yesterday, a large number of NIH employees were terminated.  The terminations were not just "administrative" positions--scientists were terminated as well.  The directs of five NIH institutes were reassigned to remote positions in the Indian Health Service, and key scientists overseeing projects on sickle cell disease, neurodevelopmental disorders and pandemic preparedness were terminated as well. At least ten principal investigators who were leading and directing medical research at NIH were fired, including a leading investigator on neurodegenerative disorders responsible for recent groundbreaking research on Parkinson's. 
• Remarkably "[r]oughly a  quarter of the agency's staff has been cut since the start of Trump's second term. " 

Sadly, despite their strong support for NIH in the past, key Republican members of Congress have been silent, apparently cowed by fear of MAGA.

The mystery is why this is happening.  I have a few theories.  First, most of the NIH research is done by Universities.  This could be yet another "own the Libs" initiative focused on Universities.  Second, Musk and his DOGE minions come from a tech bro culture that doesn't see the need for government-supported research.  The assumption is that Big Pharma will pick up the slack.  They are wrong.  Big Pharma largely invests only after the basic science is developed--which is what NIH does,  Finally, the new HHS Secretary and his spokesmen have touted the need to invest more in prevention and less in treatments,  It could be they see less value in developing new treatments for disease.

I doubt that the Trump voters thought that they were voting to halt research that could lead to promising new treatments for cancer, heart disease, Alzheimer's or Parkinson's,  but appears to be the directions of the Trump Administration.  Let's hope that Republican supporters of biomedical research in Congress finally show some courage and fight these devastating cuts.  (Don't hold your breath.)