A week after Donald J. Trump took office, senior scientists from the National Institutes of Health were preparing to give an invited speech at the Science Conference.
Scientists are completely prohibited from communicating and cannot give speeches.
As soon as the scientists returned to the office, another ban came into effect. This prohibits researchers from submitting papers to journals for publication.
Seven senior investigators working in various regions of the National Institutes of Health were introduced under an order from the government's Department of Efficiency, risking to hamper and undermine American medicine. Everything was spoken in an anonymity state.
Some say Doge began a reign of “confusion and confusion.” Scientists warned that it could seriously undermine the NIH. It is the crown jewel of American science, with a vast network of thousands of researchers in 27 centers dedicated to improving medical research on disease treatment, health and funding.
The rules seem to change every day.
Can scientists order the supplies they need to conduct research? yes. No, maybe.
Can they travel? A 30-day ban was introduced on February 26th. What happens next? No one knows.
“It's really pretty calm,” one scientist said. “They control information, cause confusion, confuse everyone and make us avoid.”
“Whatever someone is reading in the newspaper, that's ten times worse,” the scientist added.
Scientists acknowledge that the NIH is not as perfect as any other institution. For example, they have been criticized for being too cautious for failing to get opportunities in high-risk reward research proposals.
“I'm lined up in front of the line to help with a reasonable process to improve this place,” another scientist said.
A NIH spokesperson said the agency is complying with executive orders, but there are some activities that continue, including payments for supply for clinical research and ongoing research experiments. And she said, “The trip could continue for human safety, human or animal health care, security, biosecurity, biosafety or IT security purposes.”
The spokesperson was not working on the purpose of changing so many policies and practices. Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, who is waiting for confirmation from the Senate to lead the NIH, also did not address these issues during this month's confirmation hearing. However, in his opening statement, he said “American biomedicine is at a crossroads,” citing Pew survey data, which found that almost a quarter of Americans had little or no confidence that scientists were acting in the best interests of the American people.
NIH heads towards medical research around the world.
This is where the human genetic code was deciphered, where hepatitis C was discovered, where the AIDS virus was isolated, where the first drug to treat AIDS was discovered, where basic research was conducted with the Covid vaccine. It funded work decades ago that led to the creation of ozempics and other new drugs that caused weight loss.
“It's very difficult to cite important findings that have not been accepted by the NIH in any way,” said Dr. Rudolph Leibel, a professor of medicine at Columbia University, who, like most medical researchers in the United States, received NIH funding.
“If you're taking FDA-approved medications that improve the quality and length of your life, there's a 99% chance that the NIH is involved in the path to its discovery,” said Dr. Francis Collins, former director of NIH.
Currently, part of the Department of Health and Human Services, headed by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the NIH has its main campus, spreading over 300 acres in Bethesda, Maryland, with nearly 6,000 scientists working there. There are five small research centers in other states.
NIH has paid large clinical trials in areas such as cancer, heart disease, and diabetes, and has changed medical practices to save lives.
The researcher is forbidden from becoming a paid consultant in the industry. Many say they are driven by a love for science and a thirst for better humanity through their discoveries.
Dr. Monica Bertagnoli, who resigned in January as NIH director, said the scientists there are “a very dedicated to the mission.”
The agency also supports research by an additional 300,000 scientists from over 2,500 universities and medical centers. This is also threatened.
Hundreds of highly competitive grants supporting research at universities and medical schools across the country have been cut. Many of the excluded grants included explanations that included terms such as “minority,” “transgender,” “AIDS,” and “vaccine hesitation.” But the cut also has an impact on research into chronic diseases that Kennedy has prioritized him. For example, funds for grants to Columbia University have been cut for research following people with diabetes and those at risk of developing it for over a quarter of a century. (However, those funds may recover as Columbia agreed to a list of requests from the Trump administration last week.)
Programs supporting training scientists from minority groups, people with disabilities, and programs from disadvantaged backgrounds have also disappeared.
and reduced research grants that helped pay to train doctoral and postdoc students. The university is now retracting its offer to young scientists.
Senior scientists within the NIH say their work is facing daily disruptions.
Some confusion is trivial. Every NIH employee, no matter how advanced, should send a weekly email to his HR address with five bullet points that show what was achieved last week. Employees never hear a response, said one senior scientist who has been at the NIH for decades. However, scientists say he and other scientists are highly paranoid about the message.
Other consequences are more severe. A senior scientist studying rare and devastating disorders affecting young children and studying treatments invited to consult with doctors who care for such children. At the last minute, he was told he couldn't go.
“That's completely unacceptable,” the scientist said.
Researchers also struggle to purchase the basic and professional supplies needed to carry out their work.
One senior scientist said when Doge recently set a $1 spending limit on government credit cards, he apparently didn't know how essential the cards were for basic operations. For example, there was no mechanism to pay for the gas used to transport patients' blood samples.
Scientists said they had to “scramble and plead” to get the funds. A few days ago, the non-emergency supply order resumed. But the scientists said, “We now have a big backlog.” And he added that staff who processed the order were destroyed by fire.
“We're told that you should think about supplies and reagents weeks ahead,” he said.
Other scientists said they were affected by inconsistent purchasing guidelines.
“They keep changing the rules,” said a senior scientist who spent decades at the NIH, “policies change very quickly and often, and who knows.”
Another senior NIH scientist said the program he used to order supplies for his lab was closed for a month. Then we opened a day or so. “A few days later, it closed again,” he said. And it remains closed.
He needs mice with special genetic characteristics for his research.
“You can't order a mouse,” he said. As a result, he said years of work was at risk.
Scientists were chilled by destructive shootings and rehiring of employees.
On the Friday before the President's Day weekend in February, senior doctor scientists learned that around 20 technicians had been fired at the NIH blood bank where patient samples were analyzed, and this is part of an order that eliminated probation workers in their current positions in less than two years. The order also led to the shooting of probation workers preparing blood transfusions there.
Also on the list they were fired for being on probation, the NIH hospital, a fellow caregiver of the clinical center's sick patients, was dedicated to clinical research at the Bethesda campus. They included intensive care unit staff and members of the Code Blue team who respond when patients have cardiac arrest.
The supervisor was unsatisfied. These patients were ill. Who is going to take care of them?
“We're literally going to have to airlift patients,” said the senior doctor scientist.
The clinical center received a last minute reprieve after researchers paniced and protested. Doge stopped the intensive care unit doctors and allowed the NIH to rehire fired lab technicians and blood bank workers.
“It was incredibly stressful,” said the senior doctor scientist.
Other scientists have learned that work is not safe even in the jobs held by highly regarded people with seniority.
Senior scientists said lifetime employees at NIH take automatic contract renewal for granted. Now, some scientists are taking unpaid leave when the contract is gone. And wait worriedly to learn if they still have a job.
Effects ripple beyond the NIH and influence academic scientists' decisions about what types of research projects can be considered for funding.
The National Institute of Neuropathy and Stroke, located at the Bethesda campus of NIH, was planning to issue a grant to academic scientists to study blood and brain scan markers for non-Alzheimer's disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. The goal of the project was to diagnose patients more quickly and see if the experimental drugs were helping.
However, an expert review at the Institute of Neuropathy is required to evaluate these grant proposals. Doge orders will shift reviews to another office, and reviewers will not have specific expertise.
As a result, the senior scientist administrator said “we cannot run such a program.” Instead, he said, “We'll have to do something easier.”
NIH employees are worried about facing mass firing or reduced force soon.
No one seems to know who will be fired, which criteria will be used, or when that will happen, said the senior scientist who spoke about the order in question.
“I don't know, I don't know about it,” he said, tortured.
“If they said, “We're going to go to RIF administrative scientists or people over 65, or people with poor ratings,” he said.
“But this is like Russian roulette,” he added. “I don't know what's coming.”
