A million veterans gave DNA to aid health research
Data from the project has contributed to research on the genetics of anxiety and peripheral artery disease, for instance, and has resulted in hundreds of published papers. Researchers say the repository has the potential to help answer health questions not only specific to veterans — like who is most vulnerable to post-service mental health issues, or why they seem more prone to cancer — but also relevant to the nation as a whole.
'When the VA does research, it helps veterans, but it helps all Americans,' Shulkin said in an interview. Researchers now say they fear the program is in limbo, jeopardising the years of work it took to gather the veterans' genetic data and other information, like surveys and blood samples. 'There's sort of this cone of silence,' said Amy Justice, a Yale epidemiologist with a VA appointment as a staff physician. 'We've got to make sure this survives.'
Genetic data is enormously complex, and analyzing it requires vast computing power that VA doesn't possess. Instead, it has relied on a partnership with the Energy Department, which provides its supercomputers for research purposes. In late April, VA Secretary Doug Collins disclosed to Sen. Richard Blumenthal, the top Democrat on the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee, that agreements authorising use of the computers for the genomics project remained unsigned, with some expiring in September, according to materials shared with KFF Health News by congressional Democrats.
Spokespeople for the two agencies did not reply to multiple requests for comment. Other current and former employees within the agencies — who asked not to be identified, for fear of reprisal from the Trump administration — said they don't know whether the critical agreements will be renewed.
One researcher called computing 'a key ingredient' to major advances in health research, such as the discovery of new drugs. The agreement with the Energy Department 'should be extended for the next 10 years,' the researcher said. The uncertainty has caused 'incremental' damage, Justice said, pointing to some Million Veteran Program grants that have lapsed. As the year progresses, she predicted, 'people are going to be feeling it a lot.' Because of their military experience, maintaining veterans' health poses different challenges compared with caring for civilians. The program's examinations of genetic and clinical data allow researchers to investigate questions that have bedeviled veterans for years. As examples, Shulkin cited 'how we might be able to better diagnose earlier and start thinking about effective treatments for these toxic exposures' — such as to burn pits used to dispose of trash at military outposts overseas — as well as predispositions to post-traumatic stress disorder. 'The rest of the research community isn't likely to focus specifically' on veterans, he said. The VA community, however, has delivered discoveries of importance to the world: Three VA researchers have won Nobel Prizes, and the agency created the first pacemaker. Its efforts also helped ignite the boom in GLP-1 weight loss drugs. Yet turbulence has been felt throughout VA's research enterprise. Like other government scientific agencies, it's been buffeted by layoffs, contract cuts, and canceled research.
'There are planned trials that have not started, there are ongoing trials that have been stopped, and there are trials that have fallen apart due to staff layoffs — yes or no?' said Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), pressing Collins in a May hearing of the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee. The agency, which has a budget of roughly $1 billion for its research arm this fiscal year, has slashed infrastructure that supports scientific inquiry, according to documents shared with KFF Health News by Senate Democrats on the Veterans' Affairs Committee. It has canceled at least 37 research-related contracts, including for genomic sequencing and for library and biostatistics services. The department has separately canceled four contracts for cancer registries for veterans, creating potential gaps in the nation's statistics.
Job worries also consume many scientists at the VA. According to agency estimates in May, about 4,000 of its workers are on term limits, with contracts that expire after certain periods. Many of these individuals worked not only for the VA's research groups but also with clinical teams or local medical centers. When the new leaders first entered the agency, they instituted a hiring freeze, current and former VA researchers told KFF Health News. That prevented the agency's research offices from renewing contracts for their scientists and support staff, which in previous years had frequently been a pro forma step.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Gulf Today
11 hours ago
- Gulf Today
Issues over new work rules for Medicaid recipients
Katheryn Houghton, Bram Sable-Smith, Tribune News Service When President Donald Trump signed a law adding work requirements for some Medicaid recipients, he may have undercut lawmakers in at least 14 states who were designing their own plans, according to health industry observers. Georgia is the only state with a work requirement in place for Medicaid, but several states have been pursuing such a policy for years, only to be blocked by courts or, most recently, the Biden administration. Some seek state-specific touches to the new rules. Others aim to implement work requirements before the federal law takes effect at the end of 2026. These states' moves and Trump's massive tax-and-spending law share one demand: To keep their Medicaid health coverage, adults who can work must prove they're logging a minimum number of hours at a job or school, or else qualify for one of the few exemptions. But now, states that jumped ahead need to ensure their proposals, which require federal approval, don't stray too far from Trump's law. 'The statute sets both the floor and ceiling' for work requirements, said Sara Rosenbaum, a health law and policy professor with George Washington University. South Dakota, for example, announced in July that it would not submit an application for work requirements as previously planned amid concerns that the state's laxer rules would not be allowed under the new federal law. The state's Department of Social Services secretary had warned that working on a state proposal while the federal rules are being hashed out could be 'an exercise in futility.' Arkansas' plan, on the other hand, is more stringent than the federal law. There are no exemptions to its work requirements in the application, which is pending with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. Arizona's proposal also includes something that's not in the federal law: a ban on 'able-bodied adults' receiving Medicaid benefits for longer than five years total in their lives. Arkansas and Arizona government officials said they were working with federal officials to square their plans with the new standards. Andrew Nixon, a spokesperson for the US Department of Health and Human Services, said the department is analysing how the new federal standards interact with state waivers. The federal health department must release rules by next June that outline how states are to implement work requirements, according to Elizabeth Hinton, who has been tracking such waivers as part of the Program on Medicaid and the Uninsured at KFF, a health information nonprofit that includes KFF Health News. 'We don't exactly know what that will cover,' Hinton said. It's unclear how federal officials will respond to the states' requests, she added, but 'we are aware that some folks think there is no wiggle room here.' States can tweak their Medicaid programs through what are known as demonstration waivers, which are subject to federal approval. The waivers are designed to test new ideas in policy gray areas. The states that have filed or plan to file such applications with work requirements include Arizona, Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Montana, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, South Carolina, South Dakota, and Utah. Congressional Republicans who passed the budget reconciliation bill left room for states to use waivers to fast-track the national standards. Tara Sklar, a professor leading the University of Arizona's Health Law & Policy Program, said she expects states seeking certain stricter requirements to have a chance of approval, while more lenient ones may face denials. Federal officials may look favorably on Arizona's plan, Sklar said, as a five-year lifetime Medicaid limit is different from work requirements. Even if the federal government greenlights stricter work requirements than the federal law calls for, those programs are likely to face legal challenges, she added. The federal law includes an 80-hour-per-month minimum for work or education, with exemptions for certain adults, including people who are medically frail and parents with young, dependent children. Montana is the first state to draft a waiver application since Congress finalised national work requirements. State lawmakers first approved work requirements — called 'community engagement' standards under the state plan — in 2019, but the state's application stalled through the end of the first Trump term and the Biden administration. After Trump was elected again, Montana lawmakers lifted the 2025 expiration date of its Medicaid expansion program, making permanent the program that covered more than 76,000 adults in April, with the expectation that the Trump administration would approve work requirements. In mid-July, state officials released their draft plan to make that a reality 'as soon as is practicable.' The Montana plan largely aligns with the federal law, but it would create additional exemptions, including for people who are homeless or fleeing domestic violence. Republican state Sen. Gayle Lammers said work requirements that also protect such people who need Medicaid were a big part of persuading legislators to keep the expansion program. At the time, officials didn't know where the federal government would land on work requirements. And now, Lammers said, it makes sense for Montana to stick to its plan. 'The state should have a say,' Lammers said. 'We're very independent, and everyone is different.' In South Carolina, state officials are seeking to roll out work requirements for a limited number of newly eligible Medicaid beneficiaries. South Carolina is one of 10 states that has not expanded Medicaid eligibility under the Affordable Care Act, and yet the state submitted a request with the federal government in June for a partial Medicaid expansion that includes a work requirement component that largely reflects the new federal standards. In a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster, a Republican, called South Carolina's proposal 'a state-specific solution.' The only state with an active work requirement program now wants to scale it back and awaits federal approval to do so. 'Georgia Pathways to Coverage' expires at the end of September unless CMS greenlights an extension of the program with a key change: requiring enrollees to document once a year that they're working, not monthly. That's a pivot away from the program's initial design but also differs from the new federal rules, which call for checks every six months. Fiona Roberts, a spokesperson for Georgia's Medicaid agency, said the state is still waiting to hear whether it needs to alter its plan. So Georgia is among the states in limbo, awaiting guidance from the federal government.
Gulf Today
11 hours ago
- Gulf Today
Doctors decry RFK Jr decision to slash vaccine grants
Julia Musto, The Independent Doctors are sounding the alarm about potentially deadly consequences of the Donald Trump administration's decision to slash $500 million in funding for mRNA vaccine development, saying the "deeply troubling" move could leave Americans defenceless in the face of a biological attack, or another pandemic. Leading physicians and vaccine specialists were among the medical and scientific experts who told The Independent that years of progress had been lost, including the lessons learned during Covid. "This is a deeply troubling development that will, in the short term, leave the US poorly prepared for a pandemic or biological attack, and, in the long term, stifle medical innovation upon which so many Americans depend for life saving cures," Dr. Jennifer Nuzzo, director of the Pandemic Center at the Brown University School of Public Health, said in an email. Health and Human Services Sec. Robert F Kennedy Jr announced on Tuesday the termination of 22 projects, including contracts with Emory University and Covid shot-makers Moderna, Pfizer, and AstraZeneca. "We're shifting that funding toward safer, broader vaccine platforms that remain effective even as viruses mutate," Kennedy said. While Kennedy, who has questioned Covid vaccine safety and previously falsely claimed the measles vaccine contains foetal debris, cited a review of "the science" in terminating the project. But Dr Nuzzo said the "attack on mRNA vaccine technology rests on phony and false claims, proven so by real facts and evidence". She continued: "It is, however, aligned with his long-held and deadly determination to sow doubts about all vaccines and to restrict the ability of the American people to access vaccines. Our nation will pay dearly for this decision in dollars and lives." The mRNA vaccines work differently from traditional vaccines, which inject a weakened virus into the body to trigger an immune response. Instead, mRNA vaccines teach the cells to make small and harmless pieces of virus that trigger the same response. The anti-vaxxer movement and Kennedy have inaccurately claimed that mRNA Covid vaccines are deadly and that vaccines "poisoned" American children but they are safe according to decades of public research and countless government assessments. The only mRNA vaccines currently available are Covid vaccines. They were able to be brought to market so quickly because scientists didn't need the virus to make them, and the vaccine material can be created in a lab. Research also has been underway to produce mRNA vaccines against cancer and other infectious diseases, work that has been going on for decades. "While most would associate mRNA vaccine technology with Covid, it was in development for over half a century and the US government's partnership in that development goes back decades," Richard Hughes IV, a former vice president of public policy at mRNA vaccine manufacturer Moderna who teaches vaccine law at George Washington University Law School, told The Independent. "These kinds of partnerships are what drive innovation and save us from public health emergencies. When we lose this kind of progress, we create future public health risks." Scientists know it's only a matter of time before the next pandemic, when vaccines may once again be needed en masse. Dr. Jake Scott, an infectious diseases physician and Clinical Associate Professor at Stanford University School of Medicine, said that no other vaccine technology could provide the world with a vaccine as quickly as is need during a pandemic. He noted that Kennedy's decision was rewriting the history of the pandemic and the lifesaving track record of mRNA vaccines. "Vaccines aren't some niche drug. We're not talking about some rare skin cancer drug. We're talking about medicines that apply to literally every human being on the planet and we should have learned from the Covid pandemic that everyone is potentially susceptible to pandemic," Dr Scott said. In what experts have labelled an assault on science, the Trump administration has eliminated grants and dramatically reduced the workforce of federal health and science agencies. Theses actions, and Kennedy's mRNA cuts, are likely in response to government vaccine mandates and restrictions, Dr. Paul Offit, a vaccine expert at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, told The Independent.
The National
3 days ago
- The National
Nasa set to build nuclear reactor on Moon by 2030
Nasa is set to announce a new project timeline that fast-tracks the construction of a nuclear reactor on the Moon and replaces the International Space Station with ones built by private industry. The directives are expected to be announced soon by US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, who was selected by President Donald Trump as Nasa's interim administrator in July. The space agency is undergoing major restructuring, with mass layoffs and budget cuts that will heavily impact its scientific programmes and place a greater focus on crewed exploration. The push for an accelerated timeline is also a response to China and Russia's plans for a lunar reactor, which was announced last year as part of their joint International Lunar Research Station, to be launched in 2033. 'While solar power systems have limitations on the Moon, a nuclear reactor could be placed in permanently shadowed areas, where there may be water ice, or generate power continuously during lunar nights, which are 14-and-a-half Earth days long,' Nasa said in a statement last year. Powering future missions A nuclear reactor would give Nasa a reliable power source for future missions to the Moon and Mars, where sunlight is limited by long nights and dust storms. It would help keep astronauts alive, run habitats and support scientific work in those harsh environments. The agency plans to return humans to the Moon under its Artemis programme and eventually crews to Mars from there. Nasa has been working on plans for a lunar reactor since 2008 when the Fission Surface Power project was announced. Technical challenges, limited funding and a changing political landscape have brought many delays. The agency still does not have a confirmed leader. Mr Duffy, who has no background in space exploration, was appointed after the White House abruptly withdrew its nomination of billionaire Jared Isaacman. What is the timeline? In one of his directives, Mr Duffy is expected to order Nasa to select a contractor within 60 days to lead the design and construction of a 100-kilowatt nuclear fission reactor that could be deployed on the Moon by 2030. The memo, which was seen by Politico, warns that if China or Russia were to deploy a nuclear system first, they could potentially establish territorial restrictions around it, creating geopolitical challenges for US activities on the Moon. A second directive aims to speed up the replacement of the ISS with at least two privately-operated space stations. The goal is to have them ready by the time the station is decommissioned in 2030. Nasa has been working with companies such as Axiom Space, Blue Origin and Starlab to develop low-Earth orbit destinations, but Mr Duffy's directive reshapes how the contracts are managed and paid for. Once the ISS is retired, China's Tiangong will become the only station in low-Earth orbit.
