In This Issue of The Research Advocate
From Washington
Debt Deal and the Supercommittee: What It Means for Research
Remembering Sen. Mark Hatfield and Dr. Bernadine Healy
NSF I-Corps Program Hopes to Turn Science Into Startups
FDA Releases Strategic Plan for Advancing Regulatory Science
Briefing Tackles Military's Contributions to Global Health
From Research!America
Research Takes Center Stage in Montana
John Porter Speaks to Students at Northwestern's BioEXCEL Program
Global Health R&D Advocacy
Research!America Releases Global Health Fact Sheets on Georgia and California
Regular Features
Member Spotlight: Oral Health America
President's Message
Special Thanks to New and Renewing Research!America Alliance Members
In the News
Download the entire September 2011 Research Advocate as a PDF.
Debt Deal and the Supercommittee: What It Means for Research
President Barack Obama signed into the law the debt ceiling deal, or Budget Control Act, on Aug. 2. This legislation, with its long-term caps on discretionary spending, has the potential to stifle federally funded health research. We must not let that happen.
For FY12, the BCA sets a spending limit for discretionary funding that is $24 billion above the amount agreed to by the House of Representatives earlier this year. While the Senate will likely use the higher BCA spending limit to allocate FY12 funding, the House will likely adhere to its original spending limit. The BCA also created a bipartisan and bicameral supercommittee, charged with finding an additional $1.5 trillion in savings over the next 10 years. The committee's work is supposed to focus on entitlements and tax reform, and its proposal would have to pass Congress by the end of December. Should Congress and the White House fail to come to an agreement, the $1.5 trillion in savings would be realized through across-the-board cuts that would slash discretionary spending by 10% or more.
Such draconian cuts would devastate health research. Working together, Research!America members must convince Congress to prioritize funding for the agencies that help our nation maintain its leadership in medical innovation. It is critical to secure maximum funding for the National Institutes of Health and other health research agencies in FY12, because with tight spending caps in place between FY13 and FY22, we will face a steep, uphill battle to achieve meaningful increases in health research spending over that time period.
Overall, there is significant uncertainty surrounding the supercommittee and whether an agreement can be reached by the deadline. What is clear is that compelling advocacy is needed now. Our legislators must understand that health research is indispensable for revitalizing our economy, creating cures and giving hope to patients across America. Our nation cannot afford to dismantle the building blocks of medical progress at a time when innovation has never been more important to U.S. economic strength and when medical solutions are desperately needed to address an explosion in disabling and costly health conditions. Conveying this message now is key to ensuring that health research remains a top priority for the public and policy makers alike, even during tough economic times and tight budgets. To learn more and take action, visit www.researchamerica.org/advocacy.
CPH Update
The CPH Foundation held an injury prevention briefing on Capitol Hill over the summer. At several points, public health research was highlighted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's injury center director, Linda C. Degutis, DrPH. During the Q&A, more discussion on the value of research took place. If you missed the meeting, visit The CPH Foundation's YouTube channel, www.youtube.com/TheCPHFoundation, and watch clips covering several topics.
In other news, what do Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC), Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) and Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND) have in common? Each has nominated a constituent for the Unsung Heroes of Public Health Awards. Have you sent in your favorite public health hero? The deadline for submissions is Sept. 12. Visit www.cphfoundation.org/annual_awards.html for forms and information.
Advocacy & Action
Tell Congress: No More NIH Budget Cuts
The budget deal earlier this year for fiscal year 2011 reduced the National Institutes of Health budget by more than $300 million. The NIH director has reported that grant funding rates are at an all-time low.
Congress is now considering budget proposals that place FY12 funding for NIH, CDC and other health research agencies at great risk. Let them know that these agencies are critical to our nation's health, competitiveness and economic vitality. Our nation needs robust support for health research now more than ever.
Act now to support research at http://capwiz.com/ram/home.
In addition to sending a message to your Members of Congress, pass this alert on to others who will speak out in support of health research. ‘Like' this alert on Facebook and share it with your networks.
Our federal budget will continue to be a critical issue, and we need every willing voice to send our message loud and clear to our elected officials in Washington.
Remembering Sen. Mark Hatfield and Dr. Bernadine Healy
The medical and health research community mourns the loss and celebrates the lives of two champions, former Sen. Mark O. Hatfield (R-OR) and Bernadine Healy, MD, former director of the National Institutes of Health.
As chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee for six years, Hatfield made research for health a national priority. During his chairmanship, funding for NIH increased an average of nearly 10% a year.
He received Research!America's pinnacle award, the Edwin C. Whitehead Award for Medical Research Advocacy. With his encouragement, Research!America developed a series of outreach programs with schools of government and public policy launched at the Hatfield School of Government at Portland State University.
Healy was the first woman appointed to lead NIH, in 1991. She spoke with the passion of an advocate and fought to establish the NIH Women's Health Initiative and to include women in clinical trials.
She also served as deputy director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, dean of the
Ohio State University College of Medicine and Public Health and president of the American Heart Association. Her contributions to medicine and science policy saved countless lives and inspired the next generation of scientists.
NSF I-Corps Program Hopes to Turn Science into Startups
The National Science Foundation has released details on its Innovation Corps, or I-Corps, program. A five-year, $10 million grant through NSF will award $50,000 to 100 teams each year, which will enable scientists and engineers to turn their discoveries into startup companies.
Over the course of six months, the teams will be mentored by entrepreneurs and venture capitalists, and additional training will come from the Stanford Technology Ventures Program at Stanford University. The program is a public-private partnership between NSF, the Deshpande Foundation and the Kauffman Foundation.
"The United States has a long history of investing in-and deploying-technological advances derived from a foundation of basic research," NSF Director Subra Suresh, ScD, said in a statement. "And the NSF mission connects advancing the nation's prosperity and welfare with our passionate pursuit of scientific knowledge. I-Corps will help strengthen a national innovation ecosystem that firmly unites industry with scientific discoveries for the benefit of society."
FDA Releases Strategic Plan for Advancing Regulatory Science
A strategic plan from the Food and Drug Administration has identified eight priority areas for modernization of the regulatory science it uses. Those areas include: a greater understanding of toxicology to promote product safety; stimulating innovation in clinical evaluations and personalized medicine to ensure better product development and health outcomes; supporting new approaches to improve product manufacturing and quality; ensuring the agency is prepared to evaluate emerging technologies; using more diverse data to improve health outcomes; developing a prevention-focused food safety system; developing medical countermeasures to fortify against disease outbreaks or biological attacks; and strengthening social and behavioral science.
In announcing the plan, FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, MD, said, "As new discoveries yield increasingly complex products, this strategic plan ensures that our experts are equipped to make science-based decisions resulting in sound regulatory policy."
Briefing Tackles Military's Contributions to Global Health
On July 29, Research!America cohosted a Washington, DC, briefing, "The Department of Defense's Essential Contributions to Global Health," with the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, the Center for Strategic & International Studies and the Sabin Vaccine Institute. An expert panel dicussed the successes and ongoing commitment to global health R&D: Karen Remley, MD, commissioner of the Virginia Department of Health; Stephen Morrison, PhD, director of the Global Health Policy Center at CSIS; Karen Goraleski, executive director, ASTMH; retired Col. Kent Kester, MD, former commander of Walter Reed Army Institute of Research; and Sabin's president, Peter Hotez, MD, PhD.
As the audience learned, though the DoD's six Army and Navy overseas medical research labs operate on relatively small annual budgets, their global impact has been invaluable. The DoD-currently involved in the research for vaccines against dengue fever, HIV/AIDS, malaria and others-reacts and responds to emerging health threats at a moment's notice.
Research Takes Center Stage in Montana
The National Development Council of the McLaughlin Research Institute met at the institute's Great Falls, MT, lab, where the council, elected officials and the media heard of the importance of research to the state's and the nation's economy.
Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT) (pictured above with Research!America President and CEO Mary Woolley) spoke at the event, and a staff member for Rep. Denny Rehberg (R-MT)-chairman of the House Subcommittee on Labor, HHS, Education and Related Agencies-also attended. The other member of the Montana delegation, Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT), sent a letter of support to the institute.
Research!America President and CEO Mary Woolley made a presentation as well, stressing the need for federal funding for institutes like McLaughlin.
The meeting was covered extensively by the Great Falls Tribune.
Montana's bioscience sector directly employs more than 1,700 workers and indirectly supports more than 5,100 jobs. Moreover, bioscience accounts for 44% of Montana's manufacturing workforce, according to the National Center for Research Resources.
(Photo courtesy of the McLaughlin Research Institute)
John Porter Speaks to Students at Northwestern's BioEXCEL Program
Research!America's chair, former Congressman John Edward Porter, shared insights about how research is funded and approved with a group of students at Northwestern University's BioEXCEL program.
BioEXCEL brings together recent high school graduates from across the country for an intensive five-week program that provides an early glimpse of life on campus. The students, typically of underrepresented backgrounds in science, will be freshmen at Northwestern starting this fall.
The program includes classroom instruction in calculus, chemistry, biology and leadership skills, as well as trips to locations around Chicago to learn about career options with a bioscience degree.
BioEXCEL is part of the nuVIBE program-Northwestern University Ventures in Biology Education-and is sponsored by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Undergraduate and Precollege Science Education Program.
Global Health R&D Advocacy
The International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) has built innovative global product development partnerships (PDPs) to develop safe, effective and accessible HIV vaccines. In August, one such PDP-IAVI with The Scripps Research Institute, biotech Theraclone Sciences and Monogram BioSciences Inc.-made major breakthroughs in HIV/AIDS research: Seventeen new broadly neutralizing antibodies have been discovered. These discoveries pave the way for progress toward better understanding of this disease and the development of a vaccine that will be
effective against many types of HIV.
This advancement, part of IAVI's Antibody Project for HIV/AIDS Vaccines, was supported by the National Institutes of Health and saves lives by bringing the world one step closer to conquering HIV/AIDS.
For more information about IAVI's breakthrough, visit www.iavi.org/news-center/Pages/PressRelease.aspx?pubID=3209, and visit www.researchamerica.org/gh_pdp to learn more about PDPs and their crucial role in global health R&D.
Research!America Releases Global Health Fact Sheets on Georgia and California
As part of the Global Health Economic Impact Fact Sheet Series, Research!America has released two new fact sheets-this month's newsletter inserts-highlighting the groundbreaking global health research and development work being conducted in Georgia and California. These fact sheets are being shared with policy makers to make the case for supporting federal funding for global health R&D and to demonstrate the value of this work as an economic driver at the state level. In 2010, California received $3.3 billion in National Institutes of Health grants and contracts, supporting 62,000 jobs. Georgia's bioscience industry employed 62,033 workers in 2007, resulting in $16 billion in sales for the state. Visit www.researchamerica.org/global_health to download the fact sheets and to learn more about the impact of global health R&D.
Member Spotlight: Oral Health America
Oral Health America is a 56-year-old voluntary health organization focused on the role of oral health as it relates to overall health. Headquartered in Chicago, OHA's mission is to change lives by connecting communities with resources to increase access to care, education and advocacy for all Americans, especially those most vulnerable.
Oral health is the practice of preventing disease, and Oral Health America recognizes that there is a tremendous disparity between those who have access to preventive care and those who do not.
Because of this, OHA's advocacy centers around access to preventive care for underserved populations, such as children in grades K-8, teens, older adults and people with special needs.
But while its major focus related to funding and technical assistance is on these vulnerable groups, OHA's communications are for all Americans.
"Everyone can be better informed about the connection between the oral-systemic link: their oral health and their overall health," said Beth Truett, president and CEO of OHA.
OHA has three core practices: access to care, education and advocacy.
"In terms of the core practices, we ask ourselves whether OHA is moving the needle programmatically with regard to access to care, education and advocacy. Those are the needs we seek to influence-the fields on which we play," Truett said.
OHA also focuses intently on collaboration. The organization works to bring together medicine, dentistry and payment providers to provide information for the medical community and increase awareness across disciplines. They also reach out to dental and medical schools at universities to host regional symposia.
And for OHA, a membership with Research!America helps connect them with the right people.
"We feel it's a place where we need to be, because it gets us involved with people that we need to know," Truett said, "and hopefully we'll add something along the way."
Visit www.oralhealthamerica.org.
President's Message
Summer 2011 will be recalled as a time when we observed with despair the inability of policy makers to put partisanship in its place and demonstrate desperately needed leadership. While the U.S. credit rating was downgraded, Research!America has been working with our members across the country to assure that the U.S. commitment to the life sciences does not suffer a similar downgrade.
I sent brief weekly letters to our members and partners through the summer. These letters provide messages and strategies to make the case for strong, sustained investment in research with policy makers, the media and other influencers. (An archive of these is available at www.researchamerica.org.) Exciting research advocacy efforts are under way by many of our member organizations, and it is essential that this momentum continues to build.
Now more than ever, we must communicate clearly and frequently that cutting our investment in research is not a deficit reduction strategy. Appropriators now considering FY12 spending levels need to hear how important federal research funding is. And members of the congressional "supercommittee" must hear from the research community. If the supercommittee fails to do its job, the resulting across-the-board cuts to research and other discretionary spending will be disastrous to the nation.
There are sure to be many twists and turns to the appropriations process. We look forward to providing additional tools you can use to fight for research funding, and we want to hear about your efforts and successes!
Media Matters
Research and the Debt Ceiling Deal
In The Scientist, Ellen Sigal, PhD, of Friends of Cancer Research and a Research!America board member, and Karl Moeller, of the Campaign for Public Health and The CPH Foundation, both expressed concerns about future health research funding.
Larry Shapiro, MD, of Washington University in St. Louis and a Research!America board member, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that his institution receives about $400 million in research grants annually from the National Institutes of Health and would be affected by NIH funding cuts under the debt ceiling agreement.
Research!America's Mary Woolley was quoted in The Scientist and BioTechniques on the potential impact of the debt ceiling agreement on research funding. Woolley was quoted in the Baltimore Business Journal on the impact NIH cuts would have on research at Johns Hopkins University and the University of Maryland.
Advocating for Research Funding in Montana
Woolley's remarks on the importance of maintaining U.S. leadership in medical research, at the McLaughlin Research Institute in Great Falls, MT, received coverage twice in the Great Falls Tribune. Great Falls is in the district of Rep. Denny Rehberg (R-MT), chair of the House LHHS Subcommittee, which oversees research funding.
Hamburg, Collins in the News
Francis Collins, MD, PhD, director of the NIH, answered questions in USA Today about recent medical advances, the time it takes to develop a new drug and average failure rates for drugs in the pipeline.
Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, MD, wrote a Wall Street Journal op-ed about FDA's efforts to foster medical innovation, including speeding approval of new products and development of new treatments through partnerships with the private sector, academia and patient advocacy organizations.
Speaking Out: Alzheimer's Research Funding
George Vradenburg, JD, of USAgainstAlzheimer's, authored a letter to the editor in The Washington Post on the importance of funding Alzheimer's research to find treatments for this disease.
Investing in Research as a Growth Strategy
Kenneth Trevett, JD, of the Texas Biomedical Research Institute, a Research!America member in San Antonio, wrote an op-ed in the San Antonio Express-News about the important role of NIH funding for San Antonio's thriving biomedical research enterprise.
The Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported that the University of North Texas Health Science Center at Fort Worth wants to boost the school's research capacity by drawing in more public and private research funds. The article cites Research!America's 2009 U.S. Investment in Health Research Report.
Special Thanks to Renewing Research!America Alliance Members
New members
Cleveland Clinic Lerner Research Institute
Friedreich's Ataxia Research Alliance
The Ohio State University College of Nursing
Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation
Renewing members
Academic Pediatric Association
American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy
American College of Neuropsychopharmacology
American College of Surgeons
Association for Clinical Research Training
Association of Medical and Graduate Departments of Biochemistry
Battelle
Burrill & Company
Citizens United for Research in Epilepsy (CURE)
Conference of Boston Teaching Hospitals
Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine
Friends of the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research
Hudson-Alpha Institute for Biotechnology
Institute for Systems Biology
National Alopecia Areata Foundation
Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences
University of California, Los Angeles School of Dentistry
University of Kansas Medical Center
University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing
University of Toledo Medical Center
Not yet a member? Join Research!America today at www.researchamerica.org/become_member.
Download the entire September 2011 Research Advocate as a PDF.