Last week, the National Institutes of Health announced it would reduce how much funding it gives to state medical research. If implemented, Idaho universities would lose millions of dollars.
The cuts would target overhead expenses for research, capping them at 15%, much lower than the current rate of many programs. Indirect costs include things like supplies needed in labs.
“Those are things like the buildings, the utilities in the buildings, the staff at all of the institutions that make sure we don't make a mistake when we spend money to do the research or train the students,” said Carolyn Bohach, Program director at the NIH Idaho INBRE, a biomedical research network that coordinates studies across state institutions.
Since 2001, INBRE has helped train thousands of undergrads, about 600 graduate students and 50 postgrads in fields like women’s health, nutrition and infectious disease.
“These are individuals with PhD degrees that are working to make discoveries to improve human health,” said Bohach.
“Someone who has cancer or has a loved one who has cancer knows that cancer treatments change rapidly and they improve rapidly,” she said, adding biomedical research is costly but necessary to make discoveries that improve our understanding of the world around us.
The University of Idaho receives the most funding in the state. The cuts would mean a $1.4 million loss.
Bohach said this would be bad for Idaho as the change would offload the financial burden of research onto the state.
“And I suspect Idaho will not be able to collect state taxes to support the endeavor. So we will do less,” she added.
In 2024, Idaho received more than $23 million in NIH grants. A judge’s order has currently put the proposed cuts on hold.
