Advocates warn about impact on medical research as debate about automatic cuts continues

Feb 10 2013

Supporters of the National Institutes of Health argue that an anticipated $1.6 billion cut would undermine research in cancer, heart and AIDS, while adding to economic and unemployment woes.

Los Angeles Times: House Republicans Remain Torn Over Automatic Budget Cuts
Democrats appear to have embraced [Obama's] call for a balanced approach, believing Americans prefer that to the austerity measures proposed by Republicans, according to Senate aides who asked not to be identified so they could talk about the internal discussions. But Republicans remain torn over whether to stick with the automatic cuts as a trophy in their deficit busting crusade, or seek another approach that would avoid the deep hits to the military by shifting the burden onto Medicare and other domestic accounts (Mascaro, 2/6).

The Fiscal Times: Health Care Research Now Braces For Cuts
Industry and consumer advocates of health and science research today warned that an anticipated $1.6 billion cut in the budget for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) would seriously hamper cancer, heart, AIDS and other critical research, while also adding to the nation's economic and unemployment woes (Pianin, 2/6).

The Hill: NIH Sequester Cuts Will Harm Economy, Advocates Say
Budget sequestration will curtail $3 billion in economic activity if cuts hit the National Institutes of Health (NIH) on March 1, advocates said Tuesday. Advocacy coalition United for Medical Research (UMR) released new figures showing that the NIH supported more than 402,000 jobs and about $58 billion in economic output last year. The group warned that if sequestration takes effect, 20,500 life science jobs would be lost along with $3 billion in economic activity (Viebeck, 2/6).