Latest news with #NIHGrants
Yahoo
11 hours ago
- Health
- Yahoo
20 NIH grants restored to UMass system after judge rules against Trump admin
Twenty grants from the National Institutes of Health previously awarded to the University of Massachusetts system will be restored after a Monday court order from a federal judge. U.S. District Court Judge William Young ordered the Trump administration to restore more than 360 NIH grants nationwide that were the subject of two lawsuits — one filed by affected individuals and industry organizations, the other by 16 state attorneys general, including Massachusetts. The restored grants are only a sliver of the NIH grant cancellations — 2,282 grants amounting to nearly $3.8 billion of lost funding as of June 4, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges. Young declared the cancellations 'illegal,' saying he had 'never seen government racial discrimination like this' in his 40 years on the bench. Many canceled grants were related to LGBTQ communities, racial minorities and other topics considered 'diversity, equity and inclusion' (or DEI) by the Trump administration. Read more: Federal judge orders Trump admin to reinstate hundreds of NIH grants The federal government now has the opportunity to appeal Young's initial order in the cases. As part of the Monday order, 20 grants are slated to be restored to the UMass system. Listed by grant awardee, they are: UMass Chan Medical School — 'Pathway to graduate study post-baccalaureate training program' UMass Lowell — 'Longitudinal Mechanisms of Food and Nutrition Security and Cardiometabolic Health in PROSPECT' UMass Chan Medical School — 'Structural Racism and Engagement of Family Caregivers in Serious Illness Care' UMass Boston — 'U54 Comprehensive Partnership for Cancer Disparities Research' University of Massachusetts — 'Optimizing an mHealth intervention to improve uptake and adherence of the HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) in vulnerable adolescents and emerging adults' University of Massachusetts — 'Applying Deep Learning for Predicting Retention in PrEP Care and Effective PrEP Use among Key Populations at Risk for HIV in Thailand' University of Massachusetts — 'Effect of Medicaid Accountable Care Organizations on Behavioral Health Care Quality and Outcomes for Children' University of Massachusetts — 'Adapting Effective mHealth Interventions to Improve Uptake and Adherence to HIV Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) in Thai Young MSM' University of Massachusetts — 'Faithful Response II: COVID-19 Rapid Test-to-Treat with African American Churches' University of Massachusetts — 'Training the Long-Term Services and Supports Dementia Care Workforce in Provision of Care to Sexual and Gender Minority Residents' University of Massachusetts — 'Pathway to graduate study post-baccalaureate training program' University of Massachusetts — 'Improving COVID-19 Vaccine Uptake Among Racial and Ethnic Minority Groups with Rheumatic Diseases' University of Massachusetts — 'Regulated Proteolysis in Bacteria Development and Stress Response' University of Massachusetts — 'IRACDA at Tufts University' (postdoctoral training) University of Massachusetts — 'Deciphering the Molecular Features Underlying LRP1-Mediated Tau Spread (Diversity Supplement)' University of Massachusetts — 'Bacterial and Molecular Determinants of Mycobacterial Impermeability' University of Massachusetts — 'Initiative for Maximizing Student Development at the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School' University of Massachusetts — 'Improving the Part C Early Intervention Service Delivery System for Children with ASD: A Randomized Clinical Trial (Diversity Supplement)' University of Massachusetts — 'ASHA Bangladesh — An Integrated Intervention to Address Depression in Low Income Rural Women' University of Massachusetts — 'Outlining Shadows of Structural Racism Using Publicly Available Social Determinants of Health Data' In a statement Monday night, Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell called the court ruling 'a win for us all and a rebuke of the discriminatory actions carried out by this Administration. 'We won't let this Administration play politics with our public health or violate the law,' Campbell said. 'I look forward to seeing these federal funds restored to life-saving and critical health care and research.' A Harvard Medical School associate professor is also slated to see her canceled grants restored. Brittany Charlton, founding director of the LGBTQ Health Center of Excellence, is one of the individual plaintiffs suing. Her NIH funding to study the mental health of young LGBTQ people was cut in March, affecting a team of 18 researchers and causing students to fear for their safety. As federal funding cuts hit Harvard, a private investment firm and other donors step up Trump admin asks court to rule against Harvard without a trial Federal judge orders Trump admin to reinstate hundreds of NIH grants Federal judge delays decision over Trump admin barring Harvard foreign students Harvard's Monday court date will be important for international students. Here's why Read the original article on MassLive.
Forbes
3 days ago
- Politics
- Forbes
Judge Rules NIH Grant Cuts Illegal
On Monday, U.S. District Judge William G. Young declared the Trump administration's cancellation of more than $1 billion in NIH research grants 'void and illegal' and accused the government of racial discrimination. The grants targeted included studies on vaccine hesitancy, maternal health in minority communities, and gender identity. The ruling temporarily restores funding for a coalition of researchers and Democratic-led states who sued to block the cuts. Judge Young's language was unusually direct. According to the New York Times, Judge Young said from the bench that he had 'never seen government racial discrimination like this,' and later asked, 'Have we no shame?' The case marks a key moment in what academics and journalists have referred to as a broader war on science by the Trump administration — an effort to reshape the role of public science under political pressure and for ideological reasons. The decision comes amid warranted scrutiny of how federal agencies set research priorities. The direction of science has always reflected the influence of its patrons — from the Medici court's support of Galileo to the Manhattan Project's harnessing of physics for wartime goals. Since the advent of 'big science,' governments have become the principal sponsors, shaping inquiry through formal mechanisms including peer review, targeted programs, and oversight by professional staff. These procedures have not only preserved the integrity of the scientific enterprise but also enabled science to generate broad societal returns from public health and technological innovation to economic productivity yielding dividends that greatly exceed the costs of research. The Trump administration's abrupt termination of peer-reviewed grants represents a sharp break from these norms. While not necessarily unlawful on its face, this departure has disrupted the institutional systems that convert public funding into innovation — and raised fears of a mounting brain drain from the United States. The administration justified its actions by appealing to a vague critique of science as 'ideologically driven.' In court, Department of Justice lawyer Thomas Ports explained that NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya had determined some areas, such as gender identity, were 'not scientifically valuable.' Yet the selective nature of the cuts — and the absence of procedural transparency — led Judge Young to conclude that the motive was discriminatory rather than scientific. In the absence of official disclosure, the scope of the NIH grant cancellations was reconstructed by Grant Watch, a grassroots initiative led by academic scientists. That the federal judiciary had to rely on this volunteer effort for evidence highlights the fragility of scientific governance when institutional transparency fails. What is most striking is that the government itself was unable to produce a clear and accurate record of which grants had been terminated. This gap is not merely bureaucratic — it signals a breakdown in accountability at the heart of the research funding process. The long-term consequences of the ruling remain uncertain. But it points to a deeper issue: the authority of science depends not only on the knowledge it produces, but on the credibility of the institutions that produce it. That credibility goes both ways. The erosion of public trust in elite institutions does not excuse the government's ideological manipulation of the scientific process. Peer review, transparency, and procedural integrity are not bureaucratic niceties; they are what separate scientific inquiry from political opinion or ideological assertion. When those norms are ignored, the line between science and politics disappears — not because science is ever apolitical, but because its function in a democratic society depends on institutions that are seen as fair, consistent, and accountable.
