Where Data Tells the Story
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Each time America has dared to dramatically increase the NIH budget, it has catalyzed medical progress: from the “Sputnik moment” and the efforts of Hill, Lasker, and Shannon in the late 1950s, through Nixon’s “war on cancer,” to the famous doubling of 1998–2003, championed on Capitol Hill by John Porter in the House of Representatives and Senators Arlen Specter and Tom Harkin. These investments did more than expand the number of grants — they built platforms and infrastructures that accelerated the transformation of ideas into real medicines. Today, after a long period of stagnation, NIH funding is standing still, even as the greatest challenge — aging, the root cause of most deadly diseases — looms ever larger. The world is already “winning the war on cancer”; now it is time for a new decisive step. Current U.S. policymakers must show the same foresight and help at least double the NIH budget and declare a “war on aging” — to reduce mortality, ease the burden on healthcare, and open a new era of biotechnological growth.