UNM could face $20 million in lost funding under NIH rule

The University of New Mexico Hopsital on Sept. 7, 2023. (Photo by Anna Padilla for Source New Mexico)

A rule change by the National Institutes of Health announced last Friday could have major repercussions in New Mexico. Currently put on hold by a federal judge, the NIH order capped facilities and administrative costs at 15%, a significant cut for many institutions that use grants from the federal agency for medical research.

New Mexico quickly joined a coalition of 22 state attorneys general who on Monday sued the federal government over  the NIH policy, and said in the suit the University of New Mexico stood to lose millions in funding under the rule change. A federal judge sided with the states and blocked the cuts in their states on Monday. The same judge also put the NIH policy change on hold nationwide in a separate ruling for another lawsuit. 

Source NM spoke with UNM Provost James Holloway to discuss what’s at stake for federal funding and research in New Mexico.

Last fiscal year, UNM received approximately $107 million dollars in research with funding from the NIH, Holloway said. That means the NIH policy would amount to $20 million fewer dollars for research, an updated estimate from the $14.5 million cited in the AGs’ lawsuit.

The following interview has been edited for clarity and concision.

Source NM: Can you provide examples of how the proposed limits of 15% would impact research?

Holloway: The indirect cost or the ‘facilities and administration’ costs that are in question here are used to support the basic infrastructure that allows research to happen. It’s not sexy stuff, but it’s critical.

It supports things like maintaining the laboratory in which the research takes place, maintaining the  plumbing, the electricity. It supports the utilities to keep the lights on. It supports the IT infrastructure and cybersecurity. It supports the accountants to track that expenditures on the research grants are properly made. Very importantly, it pays for the people who make sure that chemicals are stored safely in the laboratory. It pays for the institutional review board who make sure that a clinical trial, for example, appropriately manages the safety of the patients involved.

The potential impacts are really quite significant because without all that infrastructure, we can’t comply with federal requirements around safety. We can’t maintain the facilities in which research actually happens. We can’t maintain the IT systems that allow the research to happen.

What are some examples of the research that could be at stake?

We have grants from NIH that support research on everything from substance use disorders to cancer treatments. The potential impact is quite broad simply because these are grants that are really helping us develop new ways to treat and cure human disease, to maintain the health of New Mexico.

If these cuts go through, how would UNM determine what research the university continues to do?

We haven’t looked at specific grants or made decisions about how we might approach any particular grant.

Between the lawsuits and the judicial rulings, this situation is moving quickly, which academia does not always do. How is this impacting your ability to make decisions?

We’ve been managing those by pulling together a really good team of people. We all have experience in managing rapid change. The key thing for us is to get the right people together to analyze the various rules or rulings that are coming out – for example, this change in indirect cost rate –and to make decisions in a way that is really calm and thoughtful.

We’re trying not to overreact to anything.While these rule changes happen quickly, their impacts will accumulate slowly over time.

What would you like people unfamiliar with research to take away from this?

What I’d like folks to take away from this is that it’s really not about how this impacts UNM and its research – it’s the impact on New Mexico.

The work that we do for NIH is focused on addressing significant health challenges for New Mexicans: addiction, cancer care, the diseases of childhood.The real potential impact is on the service that the university and others provide to support the health of New Mexicans.

It’s also, I think, worth noting that it’s a significant potential economic impact on the state: Over $100 million of NIH funding that comes into the state is mostly spent in the state, and therefore also positively supports the economy of the state.