Government Healthcare Policy, Business and Technology

NIH Funding Cuts Could Paralyze Drug Development

Government Executive: More than 90 percent of new drugs received funding from the National Institutes of Health. Now, US President Donald Trump’s proposed budget calls for cutting the NIH budget by 21 percent, or about $7.2 billion.

“Cutting the NIH budget could dismantle our ability to address real problems,” says Michael S. Kinch, a professor of biochemistry and molecular biophysics at Washington University in St. Louis.

“Take antibiotics, for example. We’ve grown accustomed to being able to treat infections, but now bacteria are becoming resistant to existing drugs. If funding cuts slow the development of new infection-fighting medicines, then in future years, many people may die from infections that once were treatable.”

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