…and we’re back.
Hope you had a restful long weekend. Congress is back to business and we’re all wearing white after Labor Day. Today’s updates includes congress’s return to business, a court victory for Harvard, and and some emerging “health alliances”.
Onto the news:
Congress returned from its recess yesterday, which mean budget drama has resumed. Stat has coverage on what this looks like for biomedical research.
The headline is that, like the Senate, the House has largely rejected the President’s budget request. NIH’s budget, for example, remains largely unchanged. Unfortunately, there are significantly cuts to ARPA-H, AHRQ, and the CDC.
The House’s bill contains language around capping indirect cost rates for certain intuitions (those subject to endowment taxes) so they do not “exceed 30 percent of an award”. I am not quite sure how that number is calculated…
A federal judge has ruled that the Administration’s freeze of $2.6 billion in federal funding to Harvard University was unlawful.
The Justice Department can (and I assume will) appeal the ruling.
In the meantime, absent intervention from an appeals court, federal agencies are required to resume ordinary processing of any halted funds.
Part of today’s decision states that the Administration cannot issue any new freezes to Harvard’s federal research funding “in retaliation for the exercise of its First Amendment rights”.
Eight former CDC directors wrote an editorial for the New York Times yesterday expressing their concerns over what has been happening within the agency.
HHS Director RFK Jr is scheduled to testify to congress tomorrow morning. Senate Majority Leader John Thune has stated that he will face “hard questions” about last week’s shakeup at the CDC. I’ll have a summary on Friday.
The states of California, Oregon, and Washington announced today that they have formed a “health alliance” to make joint recommendations on vaccination that will be informed by national medical associations, even if they diverge from federal guidance.
States in the northeast met last month to discuss a similar arrangement.
Joseph Ladapo, the surgeon general for the state of Florida, announced today that the state will be working towards ending all of its vaccine mandates.
The 18 universities in the Big Ten (I know, I know) have collaborated on an advertisement defending higher ed which will be played during college football games.
George Mason University announced last week that it is looking to settle its dispute with the Administration.