From WisPolitics.com/WisBusiness.com …
— UW-Madison says a Trump administration move to limit NIH funding will “significantly disrupt vital research activity and delay lifesaving discoveries and cures related to cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, diabetes, and much more.”
The National Institutes of Health on Friday announced it is making cuts to grants that support research institutions by limiting the amount of indirect funding for projects to 15%. Those indirect costs include things such as equipment, operations, maintenance, accounting and personnel. Those costs have averaged 27% to 28% of grants, according to the announcement.
“The United States should have the best medical research in the world. It is accordingly vital to ensure that as many funds as possible go towards direct scientific research costs rather than administrative overhead,” NIH wrote in the announcement.
In a statement late Saturday, UW-Madison noted NIH funding is its largest source of federal support and said indirect costs include things that range from building out labs where research is conducted to the infrastructure for clinical trials.
“This change will harm patients, students, faculty and the scientific enterprise,” Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin posted on X.
Meanwhile, Gov. Tony Evers today announced Wisconsin is joining a multi-state lawsuit to stop the Trump administration from “gutting funding for life-saving medical research,” noting the impact the move would have on the state, UW-Madison and other Universities of Wisconsin campuses.
“The Trump Administration’s reckless federal funding cuts will be devastating for Wisconsin and a setback for millions of people who hope and pray every day for a cure or treatments that might save their life or the life of someone they love,” he said in a statement.
See the release below.
— Researchers at the UW School of Medicine and Public Health have administered the first dose of an experimental therapy for severe dry mouth as part of an ongoing clinical trial.
UW-Madison recently announced the first person to receive the new cell therapy is Julianne McGowan, a patient with a condition called xerostomia caused by the immune disorder Sjögren’s disease. The disorder affects moisture-producing glands in the body, leading to severe dryness in the mouth as well as dry eyes and joint pain.
While some other treatments for the disease are moving through the clinical trial process, those are focused on addressing active inflammation rather than the “chronic damage” to patients’ salivary glands.
Dr. Sara McCoy, assistant professor of medicine at the UW SMPH and a rheumatologist at UW Health, sought to use a patient’s own “enhanced” stem cells to improve the function of patients’ salivary glands.
Working with the UW Program for Advanced Cell Therapy, McCoy got FDA approval in 2023 to start the clinical trial for the therapy, which relies on altered cells taken from the patient’s bone marrow and reintroduced into the target glands.
“The current standard of care is not addressing the root cause of dry mouth for these patients,” McCoy said in a statement. “With this cell therapy, we are hopeful we can do more than offer temporary relief and give these people back these critical human functions.”
McGowan first noticed the symptoms of Sjögren’s disease in 2014, but wasn’t diagnosed until 2017, according to the university. Severe dry mouth and the other symptoms of the disease can cause difficulties with eating, speaking and swallowing, and a chronically dry mouth also leads to tooth decay.
To address the symptoms, McGowan had been drinking water constantly and taking special lozenges to improve saliva production. The release notes the first phase of the trial is just focused on the treatment’s safety, but McGowan says she’s already seeing improvement.
“I had been taking several lozenges a day to help with my symptoms, but after the treatment I used them once or twice a week,” McGowan said.
The Phase 0 stage of the trial is enrolling six patients, the release shows, leading up to a Phase 1 follow-up trial focused on safety and dose levels. A cohort of 12 patients in an “expansion phase” of the study will provide early data on efficacy. After initial delivery of the therapy, McCoy’s research group will track patient results for two years.
Funding for the effort comes from pilot grants awarded through the UW Department of Medicine and the Institute for Clinical and Translational Research.
See more in the release.
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