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AGS-2: Please share your Application Status ???
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My study section is scheduled for end of June, and I'd appreciate advice on how to approach the SRO regarding two publications that are highly relevant to my proposal.
Paper 1: We are posting a new manuscript to preprint next week. I plan to submit it as Post-submission Application Material (PSAM), which should satisfy the 30-calendar-day requirement before the review meeting.
Paper 2: We have a revised manuscript under review, and we anticipate a status change (acceptance) in the coming weeks — but it will likely fall within 30 days of the study section, which I understand puts it outside the standard PSAM window. Has anyone navigated this situation? Does the SRO have discretion here, or is the 30-day cutoff firm in practice?
My instinct is to contact the SRO once and lay out both situations together, rather than reaching out separately as each update comes in. Does that seem like the right approach, or is there a reason to handle them separately?
I appreciate any insight or suggestions from this group!
My area forces me to interact with NIH/CDC and I am sickened by the way Dr. Bhattacharya behaves. I realize this is not an era of high standards for agency leadership, but I am horrified that Stanford ever allowed this person to float upwards and then his notoriety with the 2020 Great Barrington Declaration somehow gained him the traction for such an important position.
This man has zero experience practicing medicine; he is not licensed. He has never worked as an epidemiologist, never worked as a laboratory investigator, never served in any area of federal service, state service, or public health. He has a PhD in health economics. You know, the process of deciding a human life is worth $50,000 a year and then letting pharmaceutical companies price drugs to the point the "market can bear" it and ensuring government has zero ability to protect veterans, the elderly, or the disabled have protection from it.
In the extraordinary misfortunate situation where I had to listen to this man speak, he as the audacity to speak to career scientists, career public health workers like he is a "bro" on a radio talk show. He quotes films, he quips about things "moving at the speed of bureaucracy" and opines he cannot 'magically sign things into law.' He seems to despise debate, resent any form of feedback, and has issues with data that I would never have expected from someone at Stanford. Is that place a community college now?
What I find particularly reprehensible is this man signed onto the 2020 Great Barrington Declaration and openly, repeatedly attacked public health and health research. He took opportunities during a global crisis to attack and belittle CDC publications and NIH research. He never seemed to understand that... as federal employees there are strict publication and clearance requirements that limit public statements. If he did understand this, he used the very caution that public health depends on to instead attack and diminish career scientists and public health workers. Now that he is in a leadership position he seems to be discovering, to his own surprise, that you can't just author anything with the stroke a pen and a smug look.
I am disgusted that someone like this built an unearned career in public health by attacking an infrastructure he admits he never understood. I am disgusted he has the audacity to say out loud that HHS needs to win back the confidence of the American people. He apparently uses this phrase a lot.
Listen, bro, it wasn't the veterans with 25 years of experience in outbreaks deployments for malaria, tuberculosis, Ebola, and bird flu that were letting the world down. It wasn't the NIH researchers who were pushing out peer reviewed and clearance approved science as fast as they could type that let America down. It wasn't the CDC MMWR staff who you just laid off and eviscerated who were the problem. They were limited in what they could do or say by the bureaucracy you now use a defense for doing nothing yourself.
The people who worked through that pandemic and tried to keep everything working were heroes and were doing it under vicious circumstances of exhaustion. What you did in return was attack them and encourage the public to belittle them. They showed up and then they got attacked by this economist. None of the scientists, epidemiologists, doctors, or nurses I know ever lost the faith of the American public. The faith in institutions was manufactured by the media and destroyed by little scheming men who exploited one of the nation's hardest moments for their own profit.
I am so, so sorry to every single person in HHS who has to meet this man and to all the incredible researchers, editor, and scientists who are suppressed under his lack of expertise. I felt sick in that meeting.
Has anyone heard if agencies will allow additional flexibility this summer with upcoming repair/closures on several major metro stops?
It will take at least a generation for NIH to recover from the Memoli/Bhattacharya bloodbath
I know this will not be accepted broadly, but in my opinion, NIH needed a shake up. It became way too inbred. I’ve been funded continuously for more than two decades. This is what I’ve seen in a study section in which I was a regular member. The chair was well known for telling PI’s who reviewed their grants. It was also well known in our study section that certain members would take retribution in their reviews. And so it was not unusual for reviewers to not say anything negative. Reminded me of a shakedown. In an egregious move, the spouse of one of the higher-ups in NIH thought they were mistreated by a prominent institution. council next round disapproved a proposal (mine) recommended for funding. council members were routinely not disqualifying themselves, which admittedly difficult when they are all coauthors on each other’s papers. It became such a nightmare that I did my best to steer my proposals away from the seemingly most appropriate review committees. Just for fun a few years ago, i tried a new idea on that committee and of course was triaged. A few years later one of the members was funded for a large inter-institutional grant with nearly the identical title. This isn’t sour grapes; I’m retiring soon at age over 70, I finally have the freedom to speak out. And as a final note, you can’t tell me it was ethical for Fauci’s wife to be the ethics advisor.
"The FDA’s answer always seems to be the same when it comes to rare disease treatments: Wait, wait, and then wait some more."
Been hearing multiple things about the top-level HHS reviews after Council recommendations, as well as for annual renewal NOAs. Would love some insights, because my mentors are totally unsure of what is happening.
* "Policy" is a bad word now, because of supposed concerns that your policy-relevant research might be designed to support lobbying. And thus the HHS-level review is flagging RPPRs that have that word in the abstract, title, aims, etc.
* Last year some grants had aims renegotiated to ensure alignment with EOs ("diversity" was removed). But now this cannot happen for the 16 (20?) states that have court orders that supposedly protect them.
* If a new proposal recommended for funding raises flags, does it just not get funded, or can it be renegotiated, and if it is from a protected state does that differ?
The first point is super crazy because Podcast Jay keeps wanting evidence-based solutions to health disparities and other problems, which usually means looking at... policies! But consistency is not a strong point of this highly intellectual crowd...
Wait what???
NCE RPPR
For NIH first no-cost extensions on a non-SNAP award:
The current project end date is 08/31/2026, so I understand the eRA Commons NCE button likely will not appear until within the 90-day window before the end date.
Would we still receive the NIH RPPR notification email and need to submit the RPPR on 07/01/2026 while waiting for the NCE option to appear in Commons?
If anyone has experience with a similar situation for a non-SNAP award, I would appreciate any insight on how NIH handled the RPPR vs first NCE timing.
Are summary statements still being delayed in their release? I've waited 4 weeks and still no summary statement. I've never had to wait this long in the past.
Hi all, I’m starting a research-track faculty position in biomedical science at a hospital this fall, and the onboarding process has already started. Before this, I spent 7 years as a postdoc, then moved to industry for 3 years, and now I’m coming back to academia.
I have several naive questions and would really appreciate honest advice from people who’ve been through this process. Please feel free to answer any questions you’re comfortable with.
Any other advice for a new PI trying to set up a lab, manage timelines, and survive the first few years would be greatly appreciated.
Nearly 30 million Americans live with rare diseases, many of them children.
This powerful Open Letter from families battling DMD/ Huntington’s/ Sanfilippo tells President Trump and Congress:
“We do not have time for bureaucracy.”
"We represent families battling Duchenne muscular dystrophy, Sanfilippo syndrome and Huntington’s disease. Our diseases differ, but we share the same devastating reality: as loved ones decline, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is not delivering on its promise to bring forward life-saving therapies in the timeframe needed to combat these diseases.
Prior to now-former FDA Commissioner Dr. Martin Makary leaving the agency on May 12, the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies had scheduled a statutory FDA budget hearing for May 13.
Although the hearing was postponed due to Dr. Makary’s departure, FDA leadership is still accountable to the Administration, Congress, and the public as to whether or not the FDA’s $7.23 billion 2027 budget request will see funds allocated in a manner that provides the rare disease community with hope."
Hello everyone, I’ll be joining a lab through the predoc IRTA program in the summer for a year long fellowship, and wanted general thoughts about the FAES health insurance program. How is the coverage and the benefits for this health insurance plan? Have you all had issues with having procedures denied or having to go through appeals? I have some complex health issues and may need surgery in the next couple of months, and my current health insurance carrier has been good at covering tests, MRIs, physical therapy etc., and want to ensure that these types of things will still be covered without me going through a bunch of hoops with potential appeals, etc. I was also wondering if I did decline health insurance through FAES and got coverage somewhere else, do I get the premium that they would’ve paid? Thanks!
In the absence of federal guidance, states are taking the lead by forming health alliances and working with WHO directly.
“From where I sit, the federal government is not going to play the role that is needed in the next pandemic, and so we are watching states step up,” said Matthew Kavanaugh, director of the Georgetown global health policy center.
Hearing rumors about HHS RIF activities today. Has anyone heard anything credible or received notifications?