Universities like UConn and Yale are constantly doing research and clinical trials with the goal of improving our health, and much of that is funded through federal grants which are threatened with cuts.
Universities like UConn and Yale are constantly doing research and clinical trials with the goal of improving our health, and much of that is funded through federal grants which are threatened with cuts.
At Yale School of Medicine, clinical trials are being done to test a vaccine to help treat kidney cancer.
“The idea of basically harnessing the body's own immune system to recognize those cancer cells and to try to eliminate it,” Dr. David Braun, with Yale School of Medicine, said.
Braun said those trials showed promise in a small group of patients, potentially creating a new way to treat cancer.
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“We could direct the immune system and do so in a way that was long lasting,” he said.
Its studies like this that are funded through grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), a federal agency responsible for public health research. But there’s uncertainty about continuing that groundbreaking work as the Trump administration looks to make the federal government more efficient.
Already, the NIH made a policy change to cap indirect cost reimbursement for all new and existing research grants at 15%, saying this would save $4 billion a year.
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Last year, $9B of the $35B that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) granted for research was used for administrative overhead, what is known as “indirect costs.” Today, NIH lowered the maximum indirect cost rate research institutions can charge the government to 15%, above… pic.twitter.com/FSUYpEGKsr
— NIH (@NIH) February 7, 2025
Last year, Yale got nearly $646 million in NIH funding.
Dr. Kevan Herold said that reimbursement was crucial to eventually create the first drug to delay the onset of type one diabetes.
“The indirect costs that the university received gave us a place where patients could come for these clinical studies. It also supported the equipment that was necessary in order to study samples from the patients and the patients themselves,” Herold said.
UConn School of Medicine got nearly $60 million in NIH funding. The president of the university, Radenka Maric, said in a letter last month,: “…this change will impair our ability to produce innovative research that benefits all parts of society.”
But a federal judge recently blocked the cuts from happening after a lawsuit was filed by Connecticut and 21 others.
The ball is now in the government’s court as they can appeal or accept the ruling. If an appeal is made, those cuts will remain blocked until a higher court makes a ruling.
