As sad as it is to say, the answer is yes. Many people are in fear of the possibility that President Trump will get his way, meaning that a whopping 18 percent will be cut from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding budget. Hopefully, Congress will see sense, and keep supporting science instead of creating barriers.
Scientific breakthroughs are happening every day. They may not become a reality for many of us until they’re needed, such as in times of illness. But, you can be sure we are advancing, and one area, in particular, that’s showing promise is in gene editing. This will help tremendously in combating disease, and we’ve already seen several successful developments in this area including the CRISPR genome editing treatment. But, without a large amount of government funding, it would never have taken off. Now, it’s all set to revolutionize the healthcare industry.
Currently, the NIH supports more than 300,000 researchers across various projects in all 50 states, but that is all under threat with President Trump’s proposed cuts. In particular, he wants to see $6 billion cut from the NIH, which equates to almost 20 percent of the organization’s funding. So rightly so, there are a few concerns across the board. Cutting the NIH budget would cause significant delays to the research that is being carried out, and ultimately affect lives.
While some argue that private investors will fill the gap in funding, there are no guarantees that will be the case. While investors no doubt want to see good things happen, they also want to see a return on their money and may be more reluctant to invest in research where their returns may take a lot longer to come. Some of the oldest, yet best innovations have been from an exploration driven by discovery opposed to profit. By continuing to support the NIH, we are continuing to support science and indeed our lives.
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