In August, an 80 -year -old woman entered the emergency room at the Ronald Reagan Ucla Medical Center. He was clear but he is experiencing a stroke. Within a few minutes, doctors asked for permission to get the stroke -causing clot before more damage to the brain occurred.
Hesitated. The process was part of a clinical trial and had heard of a federal freezing in research grants in UCLA. He wanted to know: would this study be in danger, might affect her care?
These concerns exert unnecessary pressure on a patient with the loss of about 2 million nerve cells each minute that treatment has been delayed, said Jeffrey Saver, a neurologist and long -term stroke researcher.
“Then you have to worry about what’s going on with funding by the federal government is an unnecessary increase in patients with stress,” Saver said.
Patients and researchers, such as Saver, have been in the middle, as Trump’s administration accused major anti -Semitism and prejudice universities, pulling research funds in an attempt to export concessions.
Scientists who have spent their lives develop treatments for lung cancer, brain tumors, and Alzheimer’s disease say that scientific funding should not be politicized – and warn that patients waiting for therapies for their lives are lost. They are also concerned that funding cuts sinking into legal challenges could discourage prospective scientists to enter the field, reducing the chances of medical discoveries.
“I would believe that the stroke and Alzheimer’s disease and all these conditions affect democrats and Republicans and would be supported by everyone,” Saver said. “The reasons for the suspension do not seem to be linked to the work we do.”
In July, the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation and the Energy Department frozen $ 584 million in Medical and Scientific Research grants in UCLA, after the Ministry of Justice said the university had violated the political rights. Trump’s administration proposed a settlement that would require UCLA to pay a fine of $ 1.2 billion and campus policies for imports, intake and health care confirmed by the gender to restore grants.
However, the federal government plays a decisive role in funding the rescue research that the industry has little incentives to support. Saver said the discoveries of treatment that took place in the last 15 years were “transformative” for the care of the stroke. To maintain eight clinical trials in life, Saver said, he and other members of the Department of Neurology have requested out -of -funding and agreed with wage cuts. But it was close to exhausting before the federal funds were restored.
In ER, doctors told the patient with a stroke not to worry. Given the need to study its particular symptoms, they hit a pot of private donations to cover the process. Registered and treated.
Governor Gavin Newsom, a Democrat who has caused President Donald Trump more immediately, building a national profile, has likened the president’s demands for blackmail.
And Newsom last week threatened to “immediately remove” state funding from any University of California, signing a compact Trump that prioritized Federal Research Funds in institutions that adhere to the definitions of the administration for the gender, “California will not bankroll schools selling students, teachers, researchers and the tradition of academic freedom,” Newsom said in a statement.
In September, US Judge Rita Lin of the Northern District of California ordered NIH’s frozen grants to the state to flow again, folding UCLA researchers in a lawsuit initially brought by researchers from the University of California They threw hundreds of millions of grants on UC Campuses.
Some private academic institutions have restored their funding, agreeing to pay strong fines and change campus policies, including the University of Columbia, which agreed to pay $ 200 million and the Brown University. Meanwhile, last month a federal judge decided that the annulment of the administration of about $ 2.6 billion in Harvard grants was illegal.
Still, researchers are worried that relief is temporary. Even with the restoration of the Regional Court, the case brought by UC researchers is still pending and could eventually be decided in favor of Trump. The White House is committed to appealing the decision to restore Harvard’s funding, while increasing the control of school finances.
“We haven’t seen everything still playing. Many scientists and researchers and people running workshops are careful, knowing that in the near future could be a little abnormal,” said Jessica Levinson, a Professor of Constitutional Law at Loyola Law School. “They should feel that it is a victory. But it is likely that they are short -lived.”
US Department of Health and Human Services officials did not answer questions about possible damage to studies, while funds have been frozen or criticized that they are incorrectly politicizing money for potentially investigations.
In a statement on the administration campaign aimed at anti -Semitism, HHS spokesman Andrew Nixon said that “we will not fund institutions that promote anti -Semitism.
HHS spokesman Emily Hilliard said in a follow -up statement that the department is “stable in its commitment to promoting innovative biomedical research” and that it continues to “strategically invest in research facing today’s emergencies”.
Most of UCLA’s frozen funding have influenced fundamental science that does not directly include patients, but has the ability to significantly improve treatment. David Shaccelford, a researcher exploring new ways to immobilize the development of lung cancer -resistant cancer, said there is a possible discovery for the treatment of disease, which kills 9 in 10 patients within five years of diagnosis.
“I am not used to politicizing my science,” Shaccelford said. “It’s cancer. We should never have this conversation.”
As the court battles are playing, state democratic lawmakers are thinking of placing bond billion dollars in next year’s vote, dedicating state capital to continue progressing in cancer, stroke and infectious research. However, government bond money, if approved by voters, will not approach the replacement of federal grants, which traditionally finance the lion’s share in biomedical research.
Only in 2024, for example, about $ 5.1 billion in NIH funding fell to California, with $ 3.8 billion from universities. And the proposed counterpart would be a wide, one -off funding that could pay for other areas of study, such as climate change research, marine ecosystems or the prevention of fires.
UC President James Milliken said the possibility of even greater federal cuts in the second largest state employer would have an impact on the California economy.
While other universities have filed a lawsuit against Trump’s administration, UC leaders have been involved in the “dialogue of good faith” with the Ministry of Justice in the hope of negotiating a settlement, Milliken said.
S. Thomas Carmichael, a UCLA neurologist, said that about 55 grants totaling $ 23 million from NIH, including migraine studies, epilepsy and autism, were frozen in his department at David Geffen’s Medicine School. As bad as funding cuts are, he warned of Trump’s management to attack a school, limit the visas for international students, or begin research.
“It is essentially a complete and total mismatch of power to take the federal government,” Carmichael said. “If you just don’t give ground, you don’t give anything. You won’t win.”
Separately, in mid -September, a group of UC unions and schools filed a lawsuit against the federal government, arguing that the threat of research chapters was equivalent to “economic coercion” for adopting policies. A hearing in this case is scheduled for December.
Brenda L., a patient UCLA, said it was destroyed when a scan in 2021 led to the diagnosis of lung cancer 4 after 18 months in Tagrisso, a drug considered the gold standard to treat this particular cancer, its tumors began to grow. (Brenda refused to provide her full name because she has not revealed her diagnosis to some family members.)
“I just felt like, that’s my end,” said Brenda, who is now 75 and lives in Bakersfield. He joined a clinical trial and took another experimental drug along with Tagrisso for two years. The combination has stopped the development of cancer.
“I’m the lucky one,” said Brenda, whose current trial has not been affected. “Other patients should have the same opportunity.”
This article was produced by KFF Health News, which publishes California Healthline, a syntactic independent service of the California Health Foundation.
