Helping the Chinese with their Biological Expertise (Science Blog).

[Mort Zuckerman]

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Subject: Helping the Chinese with their Biological Expertise (Science
Blog).

Date: Nov 17, 2011 6:15 AM

Government funding really hasn't done any good. To Wit: "Lyme
Disease" (MS, Lupus, Cancer, ALS, Vaccines-That-Cause-The-
Disease...etc).

So, as a matter of fact, I contact the Chinese and Russians, directly,
to try to help them along with their science.

Been doing that since 2005...

Kathleen M. Dickson
http://www.actionlyme.org

Posted by: Kathleen Dickson | November 17, 2011 6:10 AM
=============================================================
http://scienceblogs.com/webeasties/2011/11/petition_to_increase_funding_f.php

We Beasties

"Gentlemen, it is the microbes who will have the last word" -Louis
Pasteur

Petition to Increase Funding for Scientific Research

Category: Policy
Posted on: November 16, 2011 4:00 PM, by Kevin

To do science, we need government funding. However you feel about the
free market, there just isn't a way for the free market to work on
basic research. It's too risky, with not enough profitability. The
things I discover in lab next week will never make me rich, and I'm
not aware of many Nobel winners that did their work in private
industry. We need the government to pay for what we do.

And we don't cost that much. Take a look at this chart and see if you
can find how much we spend on scientific discovery. Go ahead, I'll
wait.

Still looking? Might want to try full screen.

There are a lot of problems with doing science in the US, not the
least of which is funding. In the past few years, the percentage of
grants getting funding has dropped to historic lows, to the point
where only about 1 in 10 research grants is actually funded.

NIH payline over time

My former boss at Scripps wrote up a petition to increase funding for
the NIH. Please consider lending your voice - with the congress
critters freaking out about every penny, who knows if this will go
anywhere, but something needs to be done.

Full text of the petition after the jump.


I am writing to you today to implore you to support the House
proposal to increase the 2012 National Institutes of Health (NIH)
budget by 3.3% ($31.7 billion). Since the 1930's, the NIH has been a
fundamental supporter of basic biomedical research in the U.S. Funding
from the NIH supports research in all 50 states. These awards are made
to over 3,000 universities, medical schools, and research
institutions, and they support more than 350,000 researchers. NIH
funding to basic research has supported findings that were honored by
121 Nobel Prizes, including this year's Nobel Prize in Physiology or
Medicine. The nonprofit coalition United for Medical Research
concluded that funding by the NIH in 2010 produced $68 billion in new
economic activity, which is a greater than 100% return on our
investment!

Some would argue that the private sector should take over some of
the lost funding for academic, basic research. The sad fact is that
the private sector does not support the type of basic research that
the NIH does; they take the results NIH-funded research and apply it
to drug development. In addition, many entities in the private sector
are currently slashing their Research & Development (R&D) budgets! For
example, Pfizer recently cut its R & D budget by 1.5 billion.

Consider the following numbers. For 2011 budget, U.S. spending on:
Social security was $2564 per citizen (20.8% of the budget)
Defense was $2203 per citizen (18% of the budget)
Medicare was $1569 per citizen (12.8% of the budget)
Medicaid was $1172 per citizen (7.8% of the budget)
NIH was $99 per citizen (0.8% of the budget)

I ask you - how would cutting the NIH budget solve our current
deficit problem? Imagine the jobs we could create and the medical
breakthroughs we could make by taking a few dollars of those
appropriated for Social Security, Defense, Medicare, or Medicaid and
using it to increase the NIH budget.

Can we really afford this frightening trend, especially at a time
where the European Union and China are adopting a NIH-style research
funding system and Chinese government support of R & D is currently
outpacing our own. Sadly, the NIH budget in recent years has been
stagnant, and the current NIH budget only supports half the research
it did a decade ago. Supporting NIH funding is the best decision this
country can make to create high technology jobs for our children
(increasing our tax base) and to support life-changing medical
advances (decreasing health care costs). Funding the NIH is a small
investment that pays big dividends for our economy and our future.



KMDickson