Science at risk: The funding pause is more damaging than you might think

Lest any of these worries seem extreme, we’ll note that the new administration has labeled the soon-to-be-revoked automotive fuel economy standards as meant to “push a radical Green New Deal agenda.”

Money concerns

For grants that typically run three to five years, a hold that runs a few weeks may not seem like that big a deal. But the money doesn’t come as one lump sum at the start of a grant; instead, it’s paid out in installments that vary depending on the grant type. One senior researcher who has multiple grants said that he expected money to arrive from three of them within the next month, which might mean they get held up by this policy.

Another researcher cited the NIH’s Small Business Innovation Research grants, which help a lot of small biotech startups get off the ground. They noted that the hold will come right before monthly payrolls need to be met, which he worried might be enough to kill some small businesses.

Several people also said that even minor disruptions can be problematic because researchers typically run extremely lean operations and don’t have spare money to cover any shortfalls. “We are already dramatically underfunded in science, with granting mechanisms going over 20 years without cost-of-inflation adjustments,” one told Ars.

Most people we talked with noted that the lack of clarity about the length of the hold and the criteria for allowing future funding is exacerbated by the hold placed on all communications from the NIH. A few also expected that most people at the NIH were in the dark about the ultimate scope of the OMB operation themselves.

The final point that came up repeatedly is that these problems create uncertainty about the future of scientific research in the US. “We have a 50-year history of leading the world in health research,” one scientist told us when describing how the funding uncertainty and ideological litmus tests described above could put that at risk.

And that would have significant consequences for the nation as a whole. The money from grants helps support everyone from university cleaning staff to companies that supply specialized chemicals and equipment. Patents and spinoffs generated by the research help fuel startups in a lot of high-tech fields. As a result, the NIH estimates that every dollar it spends produces about twice that amount in economic activity. “The return on investment for dollars to the NIH and NSF are substantial and drive the economy near- and long-term,” one researcher told us.

It’s difficult to understand how putting all that at risk puts America first.