Cancer researchers examining the use of artificial intelligence to detect early signs of breast cancer. A pediatrician who tracks the long-term health of a child born to a mother who contracts the coronavirus during her pregnancy. Scientists searching for links between diabetes and dementia.
All these Columbia University projects were paid with a federal research grant that ended abruptly following the Trump administration's decision to cut $400 million in funding to Columbia over concerns about the treatment of Jewish students.
Many medical and scientific research have been completed or risks being terminated, and researchers are scrambling to find alternative funds. In some cases, researchers have already begun to inform their research subject that the research has been suspended.
“To be honest, I wanted to cry,” said Kathleen Graham, a 56-year-old nurse in the Bronx, when she learned that the diabetes research she had been involved in for a quarter of a century had been completed.
At Columbia's medical school, doctors said they were shocked as they received a notification that their funds had ended. Some have announced their resignation, while others have asked if the university could fund some of the project's staff in the short term, according to interviews with five affected doctors or professors in search of a stopgap solution.
“They're not just going to be able to get a better chance of getting them,” said Dr. Dawn Hirschman, interim director of hematology and oncology at Columbia School of Medicine. “That's what's resolved.”
Approximately $250 million of the $400 million cut imposed this month was accompanied by funding from the National Institutes of Health. Each year, the NIH distributes billions of dollars of research funding to universities for biomedical and behavioral research. These grants are the major engines of medical advancement and are successful careers for many scientists and medical researchers.
In an interview, several Columbia researchers who received grant cancellation notices in the past week and a half said they assumed that the cancelled grant was part of the $400 million cut the Trump administration announced. But they said there was still no way to know – reflecting chaos and uncertainty and involving labs and clinics around the country.
Last year, Colombia became the epicenter of national student protests against the war in Gaza. Palestinian protesters established campuses and occupied the university buildings. Some Jewish students said they had experienced harassment, roaming campus, walking nearby, and being exiled. The university president resigned in anger over the handling of the campus, which was later split, demanding that the police station clean up demonstrators.
The Trump administration denounced Columbia University, saying it was too little. It called the federal anti-discrimination laws to cut research funds to Colombia.
In addition to cutting research grants, the Trump administration removed funds for clinical fellowships for early career physicians who were developing specialties in oncology and several other fields. Other grants eliminated funds to hire research nurses and other support staff needed for clinical trials, Dr. Hirschman said.
Sudden, deep cuts appear to be extremely rare, if not unprecedented. Some legal scholars say the administration's tactics could violate the First Amendment and appear to have ignored the procedures and restrictions set out in the same anti-discrimination laws cited by the government. Since announcing the cuts, the Trump administration has called for Columbia to place academic departments in accepting positions as a prerequisite for negotiations “on the continued fiscal relationship between Columbia University and the US government.”
The cut is most readily felt by research scientists and doctors who work primarily at the New York Presbyan/Columbia School of Medicine and affiliated hospitals in Columbia, about 50 blocks north of Columbia's main campus.
In an interview, they expressed shock and sadness that their research project had been cut so suddenly. Dr. Olajide A. Williams, a neurologist and professor at Columbia School of Medicine, had two grants that ended this month.
His research often focuses on health disparities and how to narrow them down.
One grant was to study factors that lead to better stroke recovery among poor and socially disadvantaged patients. Another grant explored ways to increase the increasing screening of colorectal cancer among adults across New York City.
“When I'm sitting here trying to do this job, I really believe another mistake is wrong by hampering the structure of justice,” Dr. Williams said. “To combat the fear of anti-Semitism by punishing the nobles of the study of health disparities creates a cycle of injustice that causes pain in all aspects.”
He said he was unsure.
“Now I'm sitting in that pain and trying to navigate the reality of what happened to my grant portfolio,” he said.
More than 400 grants to Columbia University have ended, according to the National Institutes of Health. Some of the grant cancellations are felt far beyond Colombia. Large-scale research may involve researchers from several universities, but for ease of management, grants are linked to a single university. As a result, Cut has put several research projects at risk, including many universities.
Last week, Dr. David M. Nathan, a professor at Harvard Medical School, learned that funding for the diabetes research project has been cut after a group of 1,700 people over 25 years.
“We were vulnerable because the funds flowed through Columbia,” Dr. Nathan said. “When the NIH, or the person who made this decision, decided to target Colombian funds, we were kind of wiped out.”
The research project grew from groundbreaking research demonstrating the effectiveness of the drug metformin in the reduction of type 2 diabetes. These findings were published in 2001. Dr. Nathan and others followed the same participants over the next quarter century. The most recent phase funded through Columbia searched for links between diabetes and dementia.
Graham, a nurse in the Bronx, said he recently took a test and analyzed gait for early signs of neurological problems as part of his research. She said she has pride herself on helping her and other healthcare professionals create data that highlights the advice she and other health professionals give to diabetics.
Dr. Nathan said the latest phase was two years of five years of research.
“This is also a huge waste,” he said. “We don't collect all the data we wanted to collect.”
Dr. Jordan Orange, who heads the pediatrics department at Columbia School of Medicine, said one of the projects that lost funds would include searching for nose sprays to block the virus's invasion and reduce infection.
“How wonderful would it be if there was a nose spray that could block the virus?” Dr. Orange said.
Other cancelled studies include those focusing on reducing maternal mortality in New York and treatments for chronic diseases, including long symbiosis, according to Lucky Tran, a spokesman for Columbia University Medical Center.
Last week, researchers were trying to catalogue which research lost funding and which projects survived. “We're still trying to get a grasp of all the grants,” Dr. Hirschman said.
