HEALTH & SCIENCE

Are the good times over at National Institutes of Health?

The president's fiscal year 2004 budget proposal for NIH hits applied research particularly hard, some observers say.

By Susan J. Landers, AMNews staff. Feb. 24, 2003.

Washington -- The National Institutes of Health are in for a leaner fiscal year 2004 if President Bush's budget is adopted. Bedside and clinical applications -- the tangible medical advances that doctors look toward to help their seriously ill patients -- may be among the areas of science that feel the impact of this lower-than-hoped-for funding level.

After five years of 14% and 15% annual increases that resulted in a near doubling of the NIH budget -- a much-touted goal -- the president's proposed 2% increase feels something like a dousing with a bucket of ice water.

"Once you sort out the numbers, the general reaction is concern that [the proposal] is going to result in a loss of some of the momentum that has been generated as the result of the significant increases that Congress has passed over the past five years," said David Moore, associate vice president for government relations at the Assn. of American Medical Colleges.

The loss in momentum may be felt most strongly in clinical research, Moore said. "While the NIH had long been viewed as a basic science agency, the doubling came at a time when there were a lot of opportunities to move the science into closer applications to more patients," he said.

The focus on applied research was particularly strong in the neurosciences, Moore said.

If the president's budget is adopted, he added, the concern is that those opportunities will be lost -- a sentiment echoed by a range of stakeholders in the biomedical research enterprise.

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