The Trump administration is reportedly drafting an executive order that would add political oversight to National Institutes of Health grant decisions. Fierce Biotech reports that senior officials met in the Oval Office to discuss the proposal, which would create an external review layer for the agency's funding choices.
Such a move would break with the long-standing practice of letting NIH scientific staff and peer reviewers determine which research projects receive federal money. An external review process could shift funding priorities and potentially reshape the direction of publicly supported biomedical research.
The reports are based on unnamed sources, and neither the White House nor the NIH has publicly confirmed the plan. With only one account available, there is no independent verification of the details, but the impact, if enacted, would be broad and immediate.