I’ve only met one scientist who was openly a Trump fan, but I’m sure there are more out there. Still, it seems most scientists are no fans of the former president. A new WaPo piece highlights how federal scientists are worrying about a possible second term for the former president.
Government scientists & a second Trump term
Why scientists fear a second Trump term, and what they are doing about it, WaPo. There are good reasons for scientists both inside and outside of the federal government to be concerned about a second Trump term. This article highlights some of those. To me one of the biggest concerns is politics and Trump’s whims trumping data and what’s best for science and medicine.
Notably, the article doesn’t mention the NIH or FDA, two agencies that I believe could really suffer during another Trump term. If you look at the first Trump term, the FDA struggled in many ways to survive with its mission and workforce intact. Part of that was the pandemic, but another major challenge to the FDA was political pressure.
For instance, during his first term we saw several INDs approved by the FDA under political pressure. Then FDA Commissioner Steve Hahn was under tremendous pressure from Trump and other administration officials. As a result, I think he made some choices that negatively impacted CBER and the cell therapy arena. I’m going to write more about what might happen to the FDA during a second term so stay tuned for that. For those of us in the cell therapy field, there is good reason to think that CBER may be a shadow of its former self after a second Trump term.
More recommended reads
- Columbia Scientists Unravel a 15-Year Mistake in Stem Cell Research, Sci Tech Daily. Mistake? I’m not a gut stem cell researcher, but I have a feeling this headline really rubs some of those who are gut stem cell researchers the wrong way. Any gut stem cell researchers (or others) out there care to weigh in?
- MYCT1 controls environmental sensing in human haematopoietic stem cells, Nature. This is about a MYC target gene. Both c-Myc and N-Myc regulate HSCs including related to Notch signaling. I was excited to get to do some of the collaborative work in that area while I was a postdoc in Bob Eisenman’s lab.
- Adding stem cells to a kidney transplant could get patients off anti-rejection drugs, trial finds, NBC News.
- Some hawking stem cells say they can treat almost anything. They can’t, AP. One interesting thing here is Peter Marks saying the FDA provides training to state AGs as they gear up to go after unproven clinics.
- In vivo editing of lung stem cells for durable gene correction in mice, Science. This is very encouraging work with a lot of translational potential.
So, the most expensive nearly 20% of our GDP, and accelerating, so called health care system has produced precisely how many CURES for our top 10 so called most deadly diseases?
I think we’ll see a very effective Type 1 diabetes cell therapy therapy in the next few years.
Professor Knoepfler, phD,
As a person with Parkinson’s Disease (PD) I am partial to stem cell research in that area. The two studies that make me most hopeful for a cure were brought to my attention in The Niche: the Aspen Neuroscience study using iPSC ‘s and the BlueRock study using exogenously derived stem cells.
Always interested in info related to these two studies!
Thank you.
Jeff Rose, SCT