WASHINGTON — The National Institutes of Health, in the words of director Francis Collins, is “on a roll” on Capitol Hill, with the research agency likely to receive a fourth consecutive budget increase, this year amounting to roughly $2 billion.
Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), who chairs the Senate subcommittee tasked with funding NIH, announced the agency would receive $39.1 billion in the 2019 fiscal year, a $2 billion increase from 2018. A parallel House committee had provided for a $1.25 billion increase, meaning the NIH’s eventual allocation will likely rest within that range.
If the Senate’s higher version is agreed to, the NIH’s yearly funding will have increased by $9 billion, or nearly one-third, in the past four years, including the last year of the Obama administration.
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