Repost:
To further elaborate on the indirect cost cap of 15% for new and existing grants, what the vast majority of non-researchers don't understand (I was included in this group until I started to read up a bit) is that indirect costs make up, on average, 40% of the money used to run research and can run up to 75% in some cases. To be fair here, there are probably some grants that require less than 40% as well, but the average is 40% and this will cripple just about everybody who relies on grants.
From Nature, a journal many here have quoted in regards to LL or related published work, this paragraph was written shortly after a judge temporarily froze the order. Which explains the "would have cut" phrasing:
“The policy, announced late on 7 February by the US National Institutes of Health (NIH), would have cut ‘research overhead’ to 15% for new and existing grants. Last year, the NIH, the largest public funder of biomedical research in the world, awarded US$26 billion directly to scientists to help them pay workers’ salaries and buy equipment and reagents for their laboratories, while $9 billion went to these overhead, or indirect, costs, to help institutions run their facilities and cover administrative fees. The historical average indirect-costs rate has been about 40%, and goes up to 75% for some institutions.”
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-00436-1
At that 40% estimate, you go from 10 billion paid out for indirect costs down to under 4 billion. That's 6 billion dollars just, poof, gone. Immediately, with no plans to help make up a shortfall. Hell, not just no plans to make it up. No desire to make it up.
Covid showed us just how hard it is for businesses to float employees for extended periods of time when they're simply unable to operate. While this freeze isn't covid and isn't supposed to last forever, it can and probably will end some research just because of the weeks/months long inability to receive the funds they need to stay alive. Research institutions aren't money making machines.
And that's not even counting the research that could/will end when they aren't on a freeze any longer but receiving a third of what's necessary to fund their initiatives. How do they continue when it's literally not feasible to pay for the people, lab access, materials, and equipment necessary to simply perform their research. The short answer is they won't.
And those who might say that the trump administration can't withhold funds now that the judge placed a hold on that plan, there is strong evidence he isn't bothering to comply. A quick question in chatgpt shows that as of two days ago the judge has stated that it appears the administration hasn't fully cooperated.
And yeah, I understand that if you are a fan of what the President is doing it’s easy to let the ol’ liberal bias argument fly but it’s not just liberal leaning news. Its independent and non-partisan and…out of places you wouldn’t maybe expect.
Like this article from a website in a deep red state, that is considered to be non-partisan and focused more on business in the state than politics.
https://www.insideindianabusiness.com/article...nt-funding
“Indiana University School of Medicine researchers received more than $243 million in total funding from the National Institutes of Health during federal fiscal year 2023—a more than $54 million increase over the past five years, or 28%, a university press release said. Data for fiscal year 2024 could not immediately be confirmed.
A press release said this makes the IU School of Medicine No. 13 in NIH funding among all public medical schools in the country and No. 29 among all schools nationally—both a record best for the school.
According to data from a report by United for Medical Research, every $1 million in NIH funding awarded to Indiana researchers in 2022 created nearly 13 jobs, the income and other associated expenses from which generated $2.76 million in economic activity in the state. Based on that data, the IU School of Medicine’s 2023 NIH funding is responsible for creating about 3,142 jobs and an estimated $672 million in annual economic activity in Indiana—more than half of the estimated total $1.02 billion in economic activity generated in Indiana from all NIH funding in the state.”
If you take 40% of that 2023 grant money it's basically 100 million dollars. That's assuming they're right at the average, which may not be true. With that many dollars I'd wager they're higher. But at 40% cut down to 15% that represents a shortfall of over 60 million dollars. We all know what has to happen when that money disappears.
And this is what kills me. There is not a single one of us who can predict what happens when billions or trillions of money that has already been in motion for years is not just suddenly frozen without warning, but then taken away completely. The ramifications are going to be far reaching. Just look at the impact that grant money had on hiring employees and contributing to Indiana's economy?
And that's just little ol' Indiana.
The university isn't going to close, but people will lose their jobs. Some of those people are barely getting by, or sliding backwards every year with the cost of living increases or surprise medical bills. They have homes they can lose, kids that need food. It's insane that ANY administration thinks they can, relatively out of the blue, just halt such a massive and intricate machine as if they know better. They don't. The people who are in the machine, who have built the machine, who run it and service it are the ones who know and they resoundingly are trying to tell us this will be crippling.
Why on earth would you not let these in-motion programs continue while you embed yourself and take the time to learn how to make smart choices that don't amount to forcing an engine to blow a rod and thinking it'll be great for the engine. Look at how smooth this engine is going to run now that we reduced the number of rods it needs to use!
Cytodyn is potentially tied to at least two grants for major initiatives we're hoping help get LL to market and our investments to a happy place. That success is also tied to the FDA, which very well might get the same treatment as the NIH. We have a lot of shots on goals and I want all of them to remain available and on track.
But unfortunately, it is a very real possibility that Cytodyn is slowed down considerably by decisions like this. Maybe not directly, but certainly indirectly. Maybe we'll end up ok. Maybe the foundations we have lining up to run pilot studies or help get LL over the line in HIV Cure have money in the bank already and won't be slowed down or have to cut the programs looking to explore LL. Maybe Gates can convince Trump that directing funds to cure HIV should be an outlier and get funding approved where it may otherwise be taken away.
But, like the people making decisions to freeze and ultimately limit NIH funds, it's impossible to make a reasonable argument that we know for sure things won't get fubar'd backwards to when fubar was a more popular term.
This has been my long and winding road to the point I wanted to make.
Please stream Tango and Cash. It's a banger.
#Science
To further elaborate on the indirect cost cap of 15% for new and existing grants, what the vast majority of non-researchers don't understand (I was included in this group until I started to read up a bit) is that indirect costs make up, on average, 40% of the money used to run research and can run up to 75% in some cases. To be fair here, there are probably some grants that require less than 40% as well, but the average is 40% and this will cripple just about everybody who relies on grants.
From Nature, a journal many here have quoted in regards to LL or related published work, this paragraph was written shortly after a judge temporarily froze the order. Which explains the "would have cut" phrasing:
“The policy, announced late on 7 February by the US National Institutes of Health (NIH), would have cut ‘research overhead’ to 15% for new and existing grants. Last year, the NIH, the largest public funder of biomedical research in the world, awarded US$26 billion directly to scientists to help them pay workers’ salaries and buy equipment and reagents for their laboratories, while $9 billion went to these overhead, or indirect, costs, to help institutions run their facilities and cover administrative fees. The historical average indirect-costs rate has been about 40%, and goes up to 75% for some institutions.”
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-00436-1
At that 40% estimate, you go from 10 billion paid out for indirect costs down to under 4 billion. That's 6 billion dollars just, poof, gone. Immediately, with no plans to help make up a shortfall. Hell, not just no plans to make it up. No desire to make it up.
Covid showed us just how hard it is for businesses to float employees for extended periods of time when they're simply unable to operate. While this freeze isn't covid and isn't supposed to last forever, it can and probably will end some research just because of the weeks/months long inability to receive the funds they need to stay alive. Research institutions aren't money making machines.
And that's not even counting the research that could/will end when they aren't on a freeze any longer but receiving a third of what's necessary to fund their initiatives. How do they continue when it's literally not feasible to pay for the people, lab access, materials, and equipment necessary to simply perform their research. The short answer is they won't.
And those who might say that the trump administration can't withhold funds now that the judge placed a hold on that plan, there is strong evidence he isn't bothering to comply. A quick question in chatgpt shows that as of two days ago the judge has stated that it appears the administration hasn't fully cooperated.
And yeah, I understand that if you are a fan of what the President is doing it’s easy to let the ol’ liberal bias argument fly but it’s not just liberal leaning news. Its independent and non-partisan and…out of places you wouldn’t maybe expect.
Like this article from a website in a deep red state, that is considered to be non-partisan and focused more on business in the state than politics.
https://www.insideindianabusiness.com/article...nt-funding
“Indiana University School of Medicine researchers received more than $243 million in total funding from the National Institutes of Health during federal fiscal year 2023—a more than $54 million increase over the past five years, or 28%, a university press release said. Data for fiscal year 2024 could not immediately be confirmed.
A press release said this makes the IU School of Medicine No. 13 in NIH funding among all public medical schools in the country and No. 29 among all schools nationally—both a record best for the school.
According to data from a report by United for Medical Research, every $1 million in NIH funding awarded to Indiana researchers in 2022 created nearly 13 jobs, the income and other associated expenses from which generated $2.76 million in economic activity in the state. Based on that data, the IU School of Medicine’s 2023 NIH funding is responsible for creating about 3,142 jobs and an estimated $672 million in annual economic activity in Indiana—more than half of the estimated total $1.02 billion in economic activity generated in Indiana from all NIH funding in the state.”
If you take 40% of that 2023 grant money it's basically 100 million dollars. That's assuming they're right at the average, which may not be true. With that many dollars I'd wager they're higher. But at 40% cut down to 15% that represents a shortfall of over 60 million dollars. We all know what has to happen when that money disappears.
And this is what kills me. There is not a single one of us who can predict what happens when billions or trillions of money that has already been in motion for years is not just suddenly frozen without warning, but then taken away completely. The ramifications are going to be far reaching. Just look at the impact that grant money had on hiring employees and contributing to Indiana's economy?
And that's just little ol' Indiana.
The university isn't going to close, but people will lose their jobs. Some of those people are barely getting by, or sliding backwards every year with the cost of living increases or surprise medical bills. They have homes they can lose, kids that need food. It's insane that ANY administration thinks they can, relatively out of the blue, just halt such a massive and intricate machine as if they know better. They don't. The people who are in the machine, who have built the machine, who run it and service it are the ones who know and they resoundingly are trying to tell us this will be crippling.
Why on earth would you not let these in-motion programs continue while you embed yourself and take the time to learn how to make smart choices that don't amount to forcing an engine to blow a rod and thinking it'll be great for the engine. Look at how smooth this engine is going to run now that we reduced the number of rods it needs to use!
Cytodyn is potentially tied to at least two grants for major initiatives we're hoping help get LL to market and our investments to a happy place. That success is also tied to the FDA, which very well might get the same treatment as the NIH. We have a lot of shots on goals and I want all of them to remain available and on track.
But unfortunately, it is a very real possibility that Cytodyn is slowed down considerably by decisions like this. Maybe not directly, but certainly indirectly. Maybe we'll end up ok. Maybe the foundations we have lining up to run pilot studies or help get LL over the line in HIV Cure have money in the bank already and won't be slowed down or have to cut the programs looking to explore LL. Maybe Gates can convince Trump that directing funds to cure HIV should be an outlier and get funding approved where it may otherwise be taken away.
But, like the people making decisions to freeze and ultimately limit NIH funds, it's impossible to make a reasonable argument that we know for sure things won't get fubar'd backwards to when fubar was a more popular term.
This has been my long and winding road to the point I wanted to make.
Please stream Tango and Cash. It's a banger.
#Science
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