NIH announces new funding policy that rattles medical researchers

Cell lines are prepared in the laboratory of Dr. John Tisdale, a Senior Investigator at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute’s Cellular and Molecular Therapeutics Laboratory, at the National Institutes of Health on February 8, 2024, in Bethesda, Maryland. Two Americans whose lives were turned around by newly-approved treatments for sickle cell disease (SCD) tell AFP they want others to benefit too. But the eye-watering cost — up to $3.1 million per course of treatment — could limit access for other patients. Tesha Samuels was born in 1982, just before the invention of prenatal screening for SCD, an inherited red blood cell disorder. SCD affects around 100,000 people in the US and some 20 million worldwide. Most people with the condition are Black. Scientists say this is because the sickle cell trait evolved to protect people exposed to malaria, so the risk of SCD is higher. (Photo by Brendan Smialowski / AFP) (Photo by BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images)