Sir David Attenborough is 100 years old today. To celebrate, the BBC has put together a collection of 100 moments from his innumerable documentaries and PBS has posted a documentary about the making of the iconic series Life on Earth. Don’t tell anyone, but the full documentary series is on the Internet Archive.
This week’s update includes another discussion of science funding delays, the possibility of new leadership at the FDA, and the results of the DOJ’s investigation into the admissions practices at UCLA’s med school.
Federal Research Policy
NPR had a piece on All Things Considered this week on the delays in federal science funding this year. The piece (and transcript) are available here.
Stat’s piece last week on the funding delays stated that NIH is considering moving away from R01s in favor of a new award RP1 mechanism. There are currently 3 forcasted opportunities under this activity code.
GovExec has some reporting around the continuing practice of NIH scanning grant proposals for keywords that may be misaligned with agency priorities.
Public Health
This is a developing story, but multiple outlets are reporting that FDA Commissioner Marty Makary may soon no longer hold that position. All the reporting I’ve seen indicates that “plans could still change”.
The Department of Health and Human Services announced a plan this week to reduce the prescription of SSRIs. Many, many outlets have coverage. Reuters has a report indicated that the Administration may have planned to go even further.
The FDA has withdrawn several studies which purportedly reported the safety of vaccines against COVID-19 and shingles from publication. As with the cancellation of a CDC study last week, the Administration has stated that the studies were withdrawn due to methodological concerns.
Higher Education
Most Canvas users have regained access to the platform, which is used by more than half of all universities and colleges in North America. The outage was due to a data breach, for which the hacker group ShinyHunters has claimed responsibility.
The Department of Justice has concluded its investigation of UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine, finding that the school “discriminated on the basis of race for the incoming classes of 2023 through 2025, in violation of Title VI”.
The decision letter [PDF] states that DOJ seeks to enter into a voluntary resolution agreement with the University to ensure that admissions practices are brought into legal compliance.
The New York Times, The Daily Bruin, and many other outlets have coverage.
The Department of Education has opened a Title IX investigation into Smith College. The Chronicle of Higher Education and The Sophian have additional coverage.