WORCESTER — Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey warned that federal research funding cuts threaten the future of science and public health during her visit to UMass Chan Medical School on April 15, UMass Chan Medical School announced.
Joined by Worcester Mayor Joseph Petty, UMass Chan Chancellor Michael F. Collins, and Nobel laureate Craig Mello, Healey said the $30 million shortfall in National Institutes of Health (NIH) research funding is already forcing layoffs, hiring freezes, and cuts to graduate enrollment at the state’s flagship public medical school.
“We need to make clear what’s at stake here. The funding cuts are very extensive, including supporting critical work in gene therapy, rare disease research, HIV, digital medicine, neuroscience, and more,” Healey said. Later adding, “But this kind of progress is now at risk—and with it, hope is being stripped away from patients and families.”
UMass Chan received $193 million in NIH funding last year, but the school has seen significant delays in new grants since the new federal administration took office in January. In anticipation of further cuts, the school has paused faculty recruitment, furloughed or laid off approximately 200 employees, and frozen all discretionary spending.
Adding to the uncertainty is a controversial NIH policy announced on February 7 that slashes indirect cost reimbursements to a flat 15 percent—far below the rate required to sustain laboratory operations. Two days later, Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Campbell co-led a coalition of 22 state attorneys general in suing the Trump Administration, the Department of Health and Human Services, and NIH over what they argue is an unlawful and reckless cut to life-saving biomedical research support. The suit, filed in federal court in Massachusetts, seeks to block the policy’s implementation.
“These are cuts to science, cuts to research, and cuts that will be irretrievable if something isn’t done to reverse them,” Healey said, calling the changes a direct threat to public health and the state’s economy. UMass Chan employs over 6,000 people and contributes more than $2 billion annually to the regional economy.
Chancellor Collins echoed the warning, stating, “Research brings hope to the human condition, and it is shocking to an academic community like ours that research would be attacked—particularly by folks who believe that America should be the best.”
Healey also toured the Paul J. DiMare Center lab of Victor R. Ambros, PhD—co-recipient of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine—and later participated in a closed-door meeting with academic leadership to discuss the effects of NIH cuts on training, junior faculty development, and ARPA-H initiatives.
According to the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office, UMass Chan is among 219 organizations in Massachusetts that received a combined total of approximately $3.46 billion in NIH funding in fiscal year 2024 to support nearly 5,800 research projects—placing the state among the nation’s top recipients of federally funded medical research.
Take the money you are spending on illegals…stop fear mongering .