NIH employees publish ‘The Bethesda Declaration’ in dissent of trump’s policies on health research

by AKALib

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Monday, Jun. 09, 2025 Monday, Jun. 09, 2025 at 4:58:04pm PDT

On Monday, June 9, scores of NIH scientists sent a letter titled The Bethesda Declaration to the new NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya. It begins with the words —

For staff across the National Institutes of Health (NIH), we dissent to Administration policies that undermine the NIH mission, waste public resources, and harm the health of Americans and people across the globe. Keeping NIH at the forefront of biomedical research requires our stalwart commitment to continuous improvement. But the life-and-death nature of our work demands that changes be thoughtful and vetted. We are compelled to speak up when our leadership prioritizes political momentum over human safety and faithful stewardship of public resources.

The letter is signed by 92 brave NIH researchers, program directors, branch chiefs and scientific review officers, who certainly will now be targeted by the administration. An additional 250 of their colleagues across the agency endorsed the declaration without using their names.

The letter has also been sent to HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and members of Congress who oversee the NIH.

The Bethesda Declaration

Here is a summary of the concerns highlighted in the letter of the administration’s actions so far -

1) Politicize research by halting high-quality, peer reviewed grants and contracts.

Health disparities.
COVID-19, long COVID, and immunization
Health impacts of climate change.
Gender identity, sexual health, and the needs of intersex people in the U.S
Broad participation in biomedical research.

2) Interrupt global collaboration

3) Undermine peer review

4) Enact a blanket 15% cap on indirect costs

5) Fire essential NIH staff.

The letter also points out that -

Since January 20, 2025, NIH has terminated 2,100 research grants totaling around $9.5 billion and $2.6 billion in contracts. This undercuts long-standing NIH policies designed to maximize return on investment by working with grantees to address concerns and complete studies. Many terminations contradict federal regulations that mandate protections for research participants and require grant awards to specify potential termination reasons. These terminations:

Throw away years of hard work and millions of dollars. Ending a $5 million research study when it is 80% complete does not save $1 million, it wastes $4 million.

Shirk commitments to participants, who braved personal risk to give the incredible gift of biological samples, understanding that their generosity would fuel scientific discovery and improve health.

Risk participant health. NIH trials are being halted without regard to participant safety, abruptly stopping medications or leaving participants with unmonitored device implants.

Damage hard-earned public trust, counter to your stated goal to improve trust in NIH.

The full letter is at www.standupforscience.net/...?

Over 5,000 outside supporters, including more than a dozen Nobel Prize-winning scientists, added to their voice in a companion letter —

Unfortunately, many of the actions of the current administration are inconsistent with this mission and statement. These actions undermine the unique and productive partnership between the federal government and universities, academic medical centers, and research institutes that has served the American people well over many decades. They are damaging the hard-earned trust between the NIH, academia, and the public that is essential for long-term progress.

We commend the NIH staff who have come forward with the “Bethesda Declaration” to share concerns in the spirit of academic freedom, for the good of all. We stand with these committed professionals in support of reversing the harmful actions of this administration. We urge NIH and Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) leadership to work with NIH staff to return the NIH to its mission and to abandon the strategy of using NIH as a tool for achieving political goals unrelated to that mission.

The “Bethesda Declaration” states that the dissent is modeled after the notorious Great Barrington Declaration, which was published in October 2020 by Dr. Jay Bhattacharya and two colleagues, which called for a much criticized ideology-driven approach to managing the COVID pandemic by letting it rip through the population while protecting only the most vulnerable, with a baseless promise that herd immunity will protect all from a virus, which has already killed over 7 million people worldwide.

Response from NIH Director

Bhattacharya tweeted his boiler-plate ideological response to the declaration making it clear that he disagrees with everything in the letter -

We all want NIH to succeed and I believe that dissent in science is productive. However, the Bethesda Declaration has some fundamental misconceptions about the policy directions NIH has taken in recent months.

We’re working to remove ideological influence from science. NIH funding must be based on provable, testable hypotheses, not ideological narratives. Projects that don’t meet that bar are discontinued so we can focus on rigorous, impactful research.

NIH hasn’t halted legitimate international collaborations. We’re simply ensuring accountability, a basic duty when spending taxpayer dollars wisely. We need to know who’s doing the research.

...

All unadulterated doublespeak. They are cutting NIH funding by 44% for 2026. They have terminated 2,100 research grants totaling around $9.5 billion and $2.6 billion in contracts. All with zero input from NIH leadership and scientists.

Epilogue

Let’s hope that this letter results in the return of some sanity in the HHS although we are not holding our breath. If nothing else, this will serve as a record of the monstrosity of this regime and of the courage of these scientists who raised their voice in resistance and as a way to inform the public.

Let’s support these brave souls at NIH and spread this info far and wide. Let’s keep educating the public that this administration, from the top down, is infested with zealots, who are brimming with anger and resentment, who have zero subject matter expertise, and whose mission is to destroy our scientific and educational institutions and to take the country into a new dark age, where they can enjoy the satisfaction of standing over the ashes of our civilization.

You can add your name as a signatory to the letter at actionnetwork.org/...

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