the world's largest cancer-researching nation is pausing meaningful work indefinitely.
It would be sad if true, but it isn't true. The 2025 budget, which funded on a continuing resolution until September, made no cuts to the NIH budget. It is exactly the same as 2024. There are cuts proposed for the 2026 budget, but that's all still being negotiated. Things like the fight with Harvard affect Harvard, but most research in most places continues.
The current staff at the NIH and NSF have been executing and awarding grants as if massive cuts had already been enacted. In some subjects like mathematics, the rate of grants reviewed and awarded, the rate at which the pipeline moves, has dropped by ~80%.
I don't think we should exaggerate - "pausing meaningful work indefinitely" is an exaggeration - but the Trump administration has already definitely decimated biological research country-wide in a manner we have not seen in our lifetime. This is the biggest story among scientists in the country right now.
The upcoming 2026 budget will be its own battle, but what has already happened in 2025 is devastating. The budget is there, as you point out, but it is not being spent. It's worth pointing out this is all being sued in at least a dozen or so lawsuits, and is likely to be found highly illegal in most forms, but the damage has already been done, and the administration will find new creative ways to get around court orders.
It would be sad if true, but it isn't true. The 2025 budget, which funded on a continuing resolution until September, made no cuts to the NIH budget. It is exactly the same as 2024. There are cuts proposed for the 2026 budget, but that's all still being negotiated. Things like the fight with Harvard affect Harvard, but most research in most places continues.