Funding Science Saves Lives

Poster by Amy Schwartz
Article by Dr. Mike Feigin, cancer biologist

Federal funding for science is absolutely essential to the lives of everyone living in the US. We might not notice it, but federal workers are critical for ensuring the safety of our food supply, monitoring spread of diseases, predicting extreme weather events, and training the next generation of cancer researchers. The Trump administration has devastated all of these essential activities with extreme funding cuts and massive firings of the scientific workforce.  

How does federal funding of science save lives?

Funding scientific research – The federal government funds every facet of scientific research, from fundamental physics research to clinical trials of new Alzheimer’s drugs, and everything in between. This funding comes from many sources, including the National Science Foundation (NSF), National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Department of Defense (DoD). All three of these funding bodies have had their funding levels for research drastically cut since the start of 2025. As an example of the direct impacts of these cuts, patients undergoing clinical trials for advanced cancer at the NIH have had their treatments interrupted, severely impacting their lives.     

Monitoring emerging diseases – The federal government, through the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) is responsible for detecting and monitoring the growth of infectious diseases, including influenza, Covid, and the measles. Recently, thousands of scientists at the CDC have been fired, limiting our ability to detect and respond to emerging diseases. This is particularly critical as anti-vaccine advocates are now placed at the highest levels of our health system, and infections diseases once mostly eradicated in the US are making a comeback. 

Making sure our food and drug supply is safe – The federal government, through the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), protects us by ensuring the safety of our food and prescription and over the counter drugs. The Trump administration has fired over 3,000 FDA employees. This will harm the FDA’s ability to ensure the safety of our food supply and significantly lengthen the time it takes to approve new drugs. As a result, there will be increases in contaminated foods reaching all of us, with limited ability to determine where the contamination arose.

Monitoring weather events and climate change – The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is the federal agency that provides weather forecasts, severe storm warnings, and climate models, delivers seasonal outlooks to farmers to manage their planting and harvests, inspects fish and shellfish for safety, among thousands of other reports we rely on in our everyday lives. Over one thousand people  have been fired by the Trump administration in recent months. Staff shortages will lead to lack of real-time storm monitoring, making dangerous hurricanes and tornadoes even more deadly.

Training the next generation of scientists – The federal government provides funding for scientific training, from grade school through graduate school.  These programs are now under attack on several fronts. First, the government has completely eradicated programs specifically designed to support students from under-represented groups (minorities, women, LBGTQ+, low socioeconomic status). Second, the government has decreased funding levels for other programs, in many cases halving the number of students who can participate. Finally, the government is revoking visas of foreign students, forcing them out of the country and ending their educational advancement. The result of these actions is a severely weakened scientific workforce and will result in fewer scientists available to make discoveries in the future. 

What can you do to help: Contact your Congressional representatives! Tell them to reverse the funding cuts to our critical scientific agencies, including the NSF and NIH. Make sure they understand how these cuts are making the US a less safe and less healthy country, and ruining our scientific future.