NIH Budget Passed for FY 07

On December 31, President Bush signed into law HR 3010, the bill to fund the Departments of Labor, Health & Human Services, and Education and Related Agencies for the fiscal year 2006. The bill provided funding for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) at $28.6 billion – the lowest increase received by the NIH in more than 30 years. On top of this reduction, Congress also passed a 1% across-the-board cut in discretionary spending, inserted into the Defense appropriations bill (HR 2863), as a partial offset to emergency disaster relief spending. As a result, the NIH's net funding fell 0.1% over last year's. Now, the NIH will actually receive $28.241 billion for FY 2006, a cut of $33 million from FY 2005. Most budget analysts agree that many scientists will feel the impact of the reduced funding and success rates of grant applications. In fact, NIH has announced that non-competing grants will be funded at the 97.65% level, and success rates will likely drop still further.