This is not so much a diary as a plea for action. On tuesday (July 22), the Senate Appropriations committee will vote on a supplemental spending bill that will include desperately needed funds for the National Institutes of Health.
Since 2003, the NIH budget has been held fairly flat. As many more eloquent diarists have written, this is cause for alarm in the biomedical sciences for so many reasons. Students are leaving science, labs are closing, and what few grants that are being funded are often low risk- this impedes progress in many ways.
And yet, people all over the world suffer from diseases such as epilepsy (the one I study), autism (do you know someone whose life has been affected?), Parkinson's disease, substance abuse, mental illness (I know you know someone who needs help), etc
So on tuesday of next week, the Senate appropriations committee will be considering a bill that will increase the NIH budget.
Here is a link to the members of the committee
http://appropriations.senate.gov/....
Please call them and tell them that there is strong support for increasing the budget for the NIH.
Thanks!