Neglected Diseases and Patients: The NIH Funding Crisis — Timothy Yi
The proposed funding cut “means fewer new treatments, slower time to realizing some of the benefits of medical research, and probably, ultimately, an inability to advance innovative health care in the way that we have in the past,” Prensner said in an interview I conducted with him in April. Though Prensner hasn’t reported experiencing disruptions to ongoing clinical trials in his own lab thus far, cancer treatment plans have already been suspended for a number of patients across the country.
Immeasurable Talent: Trump’s Erosion of School Accountability & Choice — Ethan Yoon
Trump cuts have dulled what was once the sharpest weapon in policymakers’ educational arsenal. Since the start of his second term, the Trump administration cut around $1 billion from the Department of Education’s funding. Despite promising to insulate NAEP from those cuts, Trump cancelled the 2015 NAEP for 17-year-olds and has since placed the former Biden-appointed commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, who oversees the NAEP, on paid leave before the completion of her term. His cuts on the Department of Education’s headcount left only three employees at the National Center for Education Statistics to run the NAEP.
Doctors on Strike, Patients in Limbo: Korea’s Healthcare Crisis — Emily Kang
Trust was already strained. Doctors who work long hours, handle life-or-death cases, and shoulder high legal risk are deeply familiar with the healthcare system’s shortcomings. Many felt the new policy ignored on-the-ground realities. The government had long failed to address systemic issues like burnout, low compensation in high-risk specialties, and rising litigation. Now it was pushing a policy that, to many doctors, felt more political than medical—an attempt to boost sagging approval ratings by casting reform as a battle between the administration and obstructive elite doctors. Although the government later adjusted the number to 1,509, it was too late.