US Congress drafts funding boost

Spending bills for Fiscal 2008 drafted thus far in the U.S. House of Representatives would provide "significant increases" for key federal agency research and development programs for the first time in four years, a new analysis states. But the proposals sharply exceed budget requests by the administration of President George W. Bush, and therefore risk being vetoed.

The House's proposed increase for the National Institutes of Health - while significantly larger than the White House has requested - will once again be insufficient for the NIH to keep pace with the rate of biomedical inflation, estimated at 3.7% for the fiscal year starting Oct. 1, 2007.

"It's clear that the House is interested in increasing R&D funding relative to scientific innovation, climate change, and renewable energy," said Kei Koizumi, director of the R&D Budget and Policy Program at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). "Of course the NIH budget is really big, so it takes many more dollars to increase NIH in any significant way," he told The Scientist.

According to AAAS's budget analysis released last week (June 14), appropriations bills crafted in the House would boost funding for all major R&D funding agencies, including the Departments of Energy, Interior, and the Environmental Protection Agency. On June 11, a House Appropriations subcommittee approved $6.5 billion for the National Science Foundation, a 10% increase of $593 million over Fiscal 2007, and $80 million more than the president's budget request.

Bush has threatened to veto any individual spending bill that exceeds his original request. Ten of the 12 spending bills, including that for NIH, could fall into that category, Koizumi said.

On June 7 the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor-HHS-Education approved its spending bill, which proposes giving NIH $29.7 billion, an increase of $750 million (2.6%) above the current year, and $1 billion (3.6%) more than the president's request. This would increase the number of new and competing research grants by approximately 545 over last year, and help slightly increase the average cost of new research grants.

"There's not a lot of programs on the discretionary spending side that got a $1 billion increase," said Dave Moore, senior associate vice president at the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC). "A lot of people are disappointed, but there just wasn't enough money to go around," he told The Scientist.

Because the House bill also increases the amount transferred from NIH to the Global HIV/AIDS fund from $99 million in Fiscal 2007 to $300 million in Fiscal 2008, the net increase to the NIH budget is only $549 million (1.9%). "That means NIH will lose close to half of the expected inflationary rate increase for 2008," Jon Retzlaff, legislative affairs director for the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB), told The Scientist.

The Senate Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations Subcommittee is scheduled to begin work on its bill tomorrow (June 19). But the subcommittee will be starting with a $149.2 billion allocation for all the departments under its jurisdiction, an increase of $4.7 billion (3.3%) over Fiscal 2007 but $1.9 billion less than the amount the House subcommittee started with. "Obviously, we've got a long way to go in the Senate," Moore said.

The House Labor-HHS-Education funding bill still needs approval by the full Appropriations Committee (expected in early July) and then by all House members. Differences must be reconciled with the Senate version before it can be sent to the president.

Ted Agres
mail@the-scientist.com

Links within this article

Biomedical Research and Development Price Index: FY 2006 Update and Projections for FY 2007-2012, Feb. 5, 2007
http://www.the-scientist.com/news/home/49077/

"R&D in the FY 2008 Budget," American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), June 14, 2007
http://www.aaas.org/spp/rd/fy08.htm

House of Representatives Fiscal 2008 Labor-HHS-Education spending bill
http://appropriations.house.gov/pdf/08LHDetail_HouseSC_WEB.pdf

T. Agres, "Flat NIH funding again in '08," The Scientist, Feb. 6, 2007
http://www.the-scientist.com/news/home/49077/

Global Fund to Fight HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria
http://www.theglobalfund.org/en