Cancer Research: Evaluating the Sequester’s Impact

Extract

Causing nearly 580,000 deaths per year, cancer remains the nation’s second-leading killer after heart disease. Even so, federal support for the National Institutes of Health, which supports most U.S. cancer research, has shrunk by 20% over the last decade when adjusted for inflation. It was in that context that the federal government, which could not agree on deficit-reduction legislation earlier this year, allowed a worst-case alternative to go into effect March 1. Known as budget sequestration, or the sequester, it unleashed $85 billion in federal spending cuts that now shave 5.1%, or another $1.6 billion, off the 2013 NIH budget. That translates to a $250 million loss to the National Cancer Institute, which has already grappled with stagnant budgets averaging $4.9 billion for the last 6 years. The sequester also cuts other federal spending on cancer research, including drug approvals at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which will lose $209 million.