Some 300 current and former staffers of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have issued a call to protest the devastating cuts instituted by President Donald Trump and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., which will uproot the medical science, medical practices, and health infrastructure the United States has developed during 250 years of its existence. The call is titled, “The Bethesda Declaration: A Call for NIH and HHS Leadership To Deliver on Academic Freedom and Scientific Excellence.”
The proposed Trump-Kennedy budget, released May 30, seeks for the discretionary spending for the HHS as a whole to be slashed from $125.7 billion in fiscal year 2025, to $94.7 billion in fiscal year 2026, a cut of 25%. However, within HHS, funding for the NIH will be sledge-hammered from $47 billion in fiscal year 2025 to $29 billion in fiscal year 2026, a nearly 40% cut. This blow has fallen on nearly every section of NIH, which conducts major scientific research and is the leading federal source of funds for fundamental medical research in the nation. The NIH includes the Clinical Center, the world’s largest hospital dedicated to clinical research.
