Anil Oza , 2025-05-15 18:58:00
Attacks on efforts to diversify the sciences. Research grant terminations. Fear among scientists to speak out against the government. Cuts to international aid.
These were some of a long list of concerns shared by three research leaders as they discussed the state of U.S. science at STAT’s Breakthrough Summit West in San Francisco on Wednesday.
“What wouldn’t I be worried about?” Susan Desmond-Hellmann, a board member of Pfizer and OpenAI, said when asked what she would be worried about if she were a biotech executive in this moment. “When you’re an industry innovating, you need a really strong research and basic science group. You need to carry out clinical trials that are often global. It’s hard to do global work when other countries aren’t very happy with us, or you’re having trouble with immigration and things of that nature. So from an R&D standpoint, there’s a lot to be concerned about.”
Much of the conversation focused on the nation’s top health official, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — who appeared at hearings held by House and Senate committees just hours before. While Kennedy told the House members that his views on vaccines were “irrelevant,” the three panelists expressed concern that his vaccine-skeptical rhetoric could cause harm in the face of threats from infectious diseases like measles or bird flu.
“We’re about to lose our [measles] elimination status, and over half the states have measles cases,” said Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, who has called for Kennedy to resign. “And we have a secretary who’s promoting a toxic vitamin which causes liver toxicity in kids, vitamin A. We’re not using science. We’ve taken apart the public health infrastructure.”
Panelists also discussed ways people can advocate for research and slow down disruptions to science. Desmond-Hellmann, who is a former CEO of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, said lawsuits are important: “The judiciary branch still seems to be working.” She also urged attendees to ”vote, run for office — I’m not joking. I think that’s what real change looks like.”
Benjamin and the third panelist, Eric Rubin, editor-in-chief of the New England Journal of Medicine, have both been involved with legal challenges in the past weeks. Each received a letter from the interim U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, Edward R. Martin Jr., about alleged bias. Martin has since been withdrawn as Trump’s pick for U.S. attorney, and the impact of the letters is unclear.
NEJM responded to the letter by affirming its commitment to evidence-based recommendations and editorial independence. The American Journal of Public Health, of which Benjamin is publisher, had not previously disclosed receiving a letter. “They threatened [us], by the way, we got a letter too,” he said. “We sent back the same response [as NEJM] that said, ‘We disagree with you,’” Benjamin said.
“We’re going to make them follow the law,” he said, noting the APHA has filed five lawsuits against the Trump administration so far that have resulted in judges blocking the actions. “So we are trying everything we can to slow them down and make them follow the law.”
One early-career professor asked for advice on how to navigate the current situation. After a moment of pause, Rubin joked, “Have you considered an alternative career?”
Despite the dark mood of the panel, there was some optimism that proposed cuts — like a 40% cut to the National Institutes of Health budget proposed in President Trump’s budget request to Congress — would not transpire.
“On the plane here, I was writing an NIH grant, because it’s like the lottery. You can’t win unless you buy a ticket, and who knows what’s going to happen,” Rubin said. “So I wouldn’t discourage anyone from writing a grant, despite the horrible atmosphere you’re talking about.”
