The bleak outlook for the financing of biomedical research is causing much anxiety to $ 30.7 billion National Institutes of Health (NIH). In an unusual gesture candid this week, the NIH has described some of the hard choices in detail and reached out to the scientific community for advice on how to keep afloat the laboratories of researchers it funds.
In a post on his blog yesterday Rock Talk, NIH Deputy Director for Extramural Research Sally Rockey says the NIH budget has been essentially stable since 04 and that the agency is facing "a continuation of this trend or perhaps even declining budgets "in the years to come. "As we consider how to continue to fund biomedical research in circulation during periods of austerity, we are evaluating various options, including looking closely at how we manage the resources of the NIH," she wrote.
A related slide deck sets out various options. So far, the NIH allowed rate-the proportion of grant applications considered success that receive funding to "bottom out", which means "do nothing but let the system corrects itself, "says a slide. (in 2011, the probable success rate has slipped well below 20% for the first time.) Slides describe other options that could help stretch NIH money more further and support the success rate. These include limiting the number of grants or total amount of money an investigator can receive, by cutting the size of grants, or capping the size of salaries that can be paid with an NIH grant.
To see how these actions would help, NIH has included interactive graphics. For example, if NIH has limited the number of fellowships to three (some investigators now have six or more), it would free up $ 111 million, enough to fund 264 more new subsidies and increase the success rate 20.6% to 21.1%.
Some, if not all of these options may be controversial. For example, last week, the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) and other groups took a stand against the reduction of the highest salaries in grants of $ 199,700 to 165,300 $, as proposed by the draft the House of representatives the draft spending bill. AAMC argued that the reduction in ceilings "disadvantages" of the most productive scientists and discourage physicians to pursue research. And a recent report from a panel of expenses Senate warned that "continuing to nick away" at a rate of success or size of the Price "will inevitably have a negative impact."
Rockey encourages researchers to comment on his blog or by e-mailing: NIHResourceManagement@nih.gov
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