Trump's budget would be "catastrophic" for federal R&D

President Donald Trump's proposed 2026 federal budget envisages sweeping cuts to funding for Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) agencies – including the NIH – that will be a disaster for US scientific endeavour.

That is according to the chief executive of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), Sudip Parikh, who said that if enacted the 'skinny' budget would be "catastrophic for the nation" and mean that the US "will no longer be in the global race for R&D leadership – we will have lost it."

The comments came as Trump has sought an approximately 26% reduction in the budget allocated to HHS agencies – which also include the FDA and CDC – to $93.8 billion. An earlier version of the proposal (PDF) had sought an even bigger reduction to $80.4 billion, with Trump's overall federal budget seeking cuts of $163 billion. The FDA appears to have been unscathed in the budget request.

The NIH is bearing the brunt of the proposed cuts, a reduction of $18 billion, about 40% of the current level of $27 billion, while the CDC budget would almost halve to $8 billion and that of the National Science Foundation (NSF) would fall 55% to $4.7 billion.

The NIH is the world's biggest funder of biomedical research, providing almost 50,000 grants to more than 300,000 researchers in 2023 but, according to the budget text "has broken the trust of the American people with wasteful spending, misleading information, risky research, and the promotion of dangerous ideologies that undermine public health."

The document cites COVID-19, climate change, "divisive racialism," and gender research as the areas in which the agency has fallen down, and pledges to eliminate funding for the National Institute on Minority and Health Disparities, the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, and the National Institute of Nursing Research.

At the CDC, it is targeting diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) projects and would eliminate the National Center for Chronic Diseases Prevention and Health Promotion, the National Center for Environmental Health, the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, the Global Health Center, and Public Health Preparedness and Response, arguing these functions can be "conducted more effectively by states."

Meanwhile, the NSF is facing cuts in funding to "climate, clean energy, woke social, behavioural, and economic sciences, and programmes in low-priority areas of science."

NSF director Sethuraman Panchanathan resigned last week, 16 months before the end of his term, who warned in his resignation letter that the US "must not lose its competitive edge," adding: "I believe I have done all I can to advance the mission of the agency and feel that it is time for me to pass the baton to new leadership."

According to Parikh, the net effect of these measures will be that the economic benefits of research will accrue to other nations.

"We will lose the ability to set standards, influence priorities, attract and retain talent, and determine the outcomes for the health, prosperity and security of our nation," he said.

"America is at a crossroads. It is up to our federal lawmakers to reaffirm their long-standing bipartisan support for science and technology investment by rejecting this budget."

That sentiment was echoed by Mary Woolley, president and CEO of Research!America. who said: "These cuts, if enacted, would do little more than smooth the path for China and other competitors as they aggressively ramp up investment to eclipse the US."