Mera L🪬

Slow Release Of Federal Science Funds Holds Up Research Some money allocated for scientific research has been restored to the federal budget, but the White House OMB has been slow to release it.

This is why simply passing a budget that isn't a 37% cut is not sufficient. This is why "the extent to which funding was restored" cannot be the measure of success.

www.sciencefriday.com/segments/slo...

US health officials are trying to delay a regional World Health Organization meeting that would confirm the loss of its measles elimination status until after the midterm elections in November.

This is a reckless, accountability-dodging move that puts politics over public health.

“In summary, excising RNA vaccine research from the NIH research portfolio is antithetical to current goals of making America healthy.”

Grateful to join the great @akelvinlab.bsky.social on why we need to document the impact of MAHA funding cuts to understand the grave consequences that will follow

"Plotkin remembers the bad times, before most vaccines were developed & put into broad use. He knows the pathogens that have been largely controlled by these vaccines aren’t gone from the globe & will again sicken American children in ever increasing numbers if vaccination levels continue to fall."

You still had 100 characters left to use after the text in this post. You could have included this sentence (69 characters).

There is no evidence that ivermectin works as a treatment for cancer.

$300 Million in jet planes lost to a fuckup.

That’s 83 five year NIH R01 grants burned in minutes due to error, aka poor execution of this unnecessary war which serves only to make the world more dangerous.

Measles outbreaks are costing the U.S. millions of dollars. The true losses can't be counted. As vaccination rates decline, the economic consequences will increase, research suggests.

Measles is costing the U.S. millions of dollars. The true losses can't be counted. www.nbcnews.com/health/kids-... via @nbcnews.com @erikaedwards.bsky.social

States Move to Limit Access to H.I.V. Treatment

Tens of thousands of Americans are losing access to treatment for H.I.V. as nearly 20 states impose restrictions on assistance programs and several others weigh such changes.

www.nytimes.com/2026/03/02/h...

fuck

The NIH Restructuring Congress Rejected Is Happening Anyway (I used Gemini Nano Banana 2 to create this fictional image.)

This piece by Elizabeth Ginexi is a must read. Trump, Vought, RFK and Bhattacharya are destroying the NIH simply ignoring the law and the US Congress. It’s illegal and immoral. The NIH Restructuring Congress Rejected Is Happening Anyway open.substack.com/pub/elizabet...

Study Warns of Large Increase in New HIV Cases in U.S. if Ryan White Program Ends Colorado and several Southern and Midwest states would see the biggest increases in incidence

Worried about this one

www.medpagetoday.com/meetingcover...

Hepatitis B vaccine trial is suspended, not canceled The Bandim Health Project says it’s working on changing its protocol to address concerns while doubling down on its claim that the study design is ethical.

Apparently, it is not yet dead.
"Hepatitis B vaccine trial is suspended, not canceled, per Africa CDC"

www.bioxconomy.com/modalities/h...

West Texas children treated for vitamin A toxicity after measles hospitalizations The children were hospitalized with measles complications and tested positive for abnormal liver function.

Yep- and it landed kids in the damn hospital

Not spending money that is appropriated for science is a tricky subject to explain, but for people in limbo (like myself, as I mentioned yesterday), it can have cause serious career harm.

Many celebrated the NIH budget bill. It’s not supporting science when an unchecked bottleneck still remains.

Yep. That’s why we are rallying around the nation to save science, protect health, and defend democracy on March 7th!

@standupforscience.bsky.social

Standupforscience.net/march7

We perversely had a system during the pandemic where it was effectively illegal to show footage of someone dying of Covid but legal to upload a video of yourself faking vaccine side effects. Antivaxers exploited this warped information environment

The Epstein files document what many women researchers have long experienced but rarely seen laid bare so starkly: exclusion operating behind closed doors, shaping who gets funded, invited, mentored, and taken seriously. How many of these networks, norms, and gatekeepers remain in place?

Idk how much more clearly I can spell this out, but the NIH budget doesn’t matter when THESE ARE THE PEOPLE deciding how to spend the money.

See you in the streets March 7th.

TB and HIV treatments are not enough for a full recovery - Texas Biomed Existing treatments for tuberculosis (TB) and HIV control the pathogens, but the immune system does not revert to normal, according to research by Texas

Existing treatments for #tuberculosis and HIV control the pathogens, but the immune system does not revert to normal

The preclinical findings help explain why people living with #HIV likely remain more susceptible to other illness and reinfection with #TB – and point to the need for new therapies

America’s science and medical research system may have been world-class before but did not have the institutional and legal safeguards to prevent a grievance-fueled takeover. This piece unpacks the COVID origins of that grievance and the imperatives for a transformation. https://substack.com/home/post/p-188677740

Grievance Is All You Need

.... understanding attacks on NIH, CDC and FDA through the lens of COVID revisionists:

joshuasweitz.substack.com/p/grievance-...

He has internalized a narrative of the NIH borne of animus toward Fauci and Collins. The reality of the institution certainly seems to have stumped him. He appears to be podcasting through it, tho.

I can't fathom the thought process that makes people go after the IM vitamin K given to newborns to prevent vitamin K deficiency bleeding. There is possibly no other medical intervention in existence where the risk-benefit ratio is so clearly on the side of benefit.

It's honestly really upsetting.

Dr. Bhattacharya recently came to U. Chicago for an "off the record" event. My strong impression was that he is truly unfamiliar with how most biomedical research works.

May we all see the day when this story is in citi human subjects research training modules

“The more people know about what RFK Jr. is up to, the less they trust the services he oversees. People who have heard about the vaccine schedule changes are about twice as likely to say they will have a negative impact on kids rather than a positive impact.”

Screenshot from an NIH website reading: "Table 1 shows the number of principal investigators (PIs) applying for or receiving an R01-equivalent grant in FYs 2021 to 2025, disaggregated by career stage. NIH supported 1,423 and 1,144 ESIs in FYs 2024 and 2025, respectively. The decrease seen in FY 2025 may likely be due in part to NIH implementing a requirement to use 50% of its remaining competing Research Project Grant (RPG) funds (starting in June 2025) for full-year funded competing RPGs, which was expected to lead to fewer awards and support fewer researchers overall."

Check this out straight from the NIH website, acknowledging that multiyear funding was likely responsible for a 20% decrease in early stage investigators.

And that it was expected.

A strange approach for someone so committed to the next generation of scientists.

grants.nih.gov/news-events/...

After leaving WHO, Trump officials propose more expensive replacement to duplicate it HHS proposes spending $2 billion a year to re-create systems the U.S. accessed through the WHO at a fraction of the cost, according to officials briefed on the matter.

So the White House withdrew from the WHO, only to propose spending billions to try and replicate its functions in a much more inefficient and ineffective system. Ridiculous.

A Dazzling Tower of Inference: A Review of Muddy Waters — AJI AJI’s own Wendy Orent offers a critical review of Muddy Waters , a recent book arguing that COVID-19 emerged from a laboratory.

Excellent review of lab leak nonsense from @wendyorent.bsky.social

www.accountabilityjournalism.org/insights/4nd...

Just signed up to volunteer for the Research Triangle SUFS!

If you’re decimating one public health agency, how hard can it be to decimate two?🤦🏻‍♂️🤦🏻‍♂️🤦🏻‍♂️