A scientist demonstrates pipetting viscous genomic DNA at the NIH Intramural Sequencing Center in Rockville, MD on April 13, 2023.
The move caused anger and confusion among both HHS officials and those in the broader medical community. Following the directive, scientific meetings and grant reviews were canceled, raising significant concerns about the impact on research.
"We write to express our grave concerns about actions that have taken place in recent days that potentially disrupt lifesaving research being conducted and supported by the National Institutes of Health," a trio of Democratic lawmakers from Maryland said in a Monday letter to HHS's Acting Secretary Dr. Dorothy Fink. "Without quick corrective action, the consequences of further disruption could be disastrous."
According to Memoli's memo, while agency officials are not permitted to begin new research while the pause is in effect, any research or clinical trials initiated before Jan. 20 can keep going "so that this work can continue, and we do not lose our investment in these studies." Officials working on these studies may also purchase any "necessary supplies" and conduct meetings related to such work. Although new research projects are still prohibited, NIH staff can continue submitting papers to medical journals and can communicate with those journals about submitted work.
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The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services building, also known as the Hubert H. Humphrey Building, is located at the foot of Capitol Hill in the nation's capital. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
While the pause at HHS has caused a firestorm of concern and criticism, a former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention scientist who is now the dean of the University of Nebraska's school of public health, Dr. Ali Khan, told the Associated Press that such pauses are not unusual. Khan said concern is only warranted if the pause was aimed at "silencing the agencies around a political narrative."
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"I think the intention of such a chaotic freezing of communications was to scare us, to demoralize us, and to set science back a bit in an effort to make us look bad," said a long-time NIH staffer who spoke to Forbes on the condition of anonymity. "We are by no means perfect, but, ffs, our job is literally to enable research to save lives, what the heck?"
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