SRCD signed on to a Friends of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development letter on the need for continued support for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) during the Fiscal Year (FY) 2022 appropriations process.
Consistent with the Ad Hoc Group for Medical Research’s FY 2022 recommendation, the letter calls for a comparable funding increase for NICHD and underscores the need for an emergency supplemental appropriation that would support pandemic-related research (e.g., research on children, pregnant women, mothers and babies, individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities, etc.), and research relief funds for NIH.
The letter states, “While we are grateful for the sustained increases in funding the institute has received in recent years, the lack of dedicated supplemental funding to expand research into areas of scientific inquiry critical to addressing the pandemic threatens to divert core institute funding away from other promising science and delay the next generation of cures for NICHD's populations should the institute not have sufficient funding to address all these urgent research needs.”
The Friends of NICHD is a coalition of over 100 organizations who advocate for the interests of the NICHD during the annual appropriations and budget processes and highlight NICHD-funded research activities on and off the Hill. The Society for Research in Child Development is a Friends of NICHD member.