Lots of options here & you *should* write in with your comment. Here's another piece that might resonate with you (and which I've written about extensively here). Take care.

From the post "The NIH proposal to conceal reviewer scores should be read as part of a larger project to sideline the research community and, instead, turn to political appointees and loyalists to determine who and what gets funded." I think that is clear.

It's a long piece, I am not being coy. "The NIH proposal to conceal reviewer scores should be read as part of a larger project to sideline the research community and, instead, turn to political appointees and loyalists to determine who and what gets funded."

If the NIH succeeds in hiding reviewer scores, both program officers and investigators will have access to less information, increasing the risk that other factors (including political priorities) will be used to shape the future of US science and biomedical research.

The proposal also proposes to institutionalize an error that would not be permitted in its own evaluation of submitted grants: the Center for Scientific Review proposal would intentionally obscure and then conceal primary data.

The proposal is poorly conceived, reduces transparency, and will create new, even worse, problems in evaluating investigator-initiated research, e.g., generating large-scale differences in perceived importance from almost certainly insignificant differences in reviewer opinion.

In essence, NIH’s Center for Scientific Review will now seek input from expert reviewers, ask them to evaluate proposals, collect scores, and then intentionally hide scores from investigators & program officers.

The NIH proposal to conceal reviewer scores from program officers, investigators, and advisory councils is ill-conceived, introduces disproportionate weight to small percentile differences, diminishes the role of scientific peer review, and should be withdrawn in its entirety. a 🧵

I’ve seen a few folks comment that “Guinea-Bissau is a low income country and cannot afford the hep B vaccine birth dose, so why is this study unethical?” It’s a good question. Let me have a go at answering it. In a nutshell, researchers cannot ethically exploit poverty & scarcity to do a trial

Friday measles update; as expected cruised past 4,000 cases: now 4,080. The year I graduated medical school (2002) there were 44. Yes, 44. We’ve multiplied cases by 100 😳 Disinformation is effective 🤦🏻‍♂️🤦🏻‍♂️🤦🏻‍♂️

It’s hard to believe that CDC Director Dr. Erica Schwartz hasn’t had extensive training in research ethics. That means she’s intentionally going to let babies in Guinea-Bissau be infected with Hepatitis B by withholding vaccine when they have vaccine available.

In case you hadn't been following this disturbing sequence of events, here's a recap: RFK Jr wanted to fund a randomized trial, run by Danes, involving newborn babies in Guinea-Bissau Ethicists across the world, including in Nigeria, Cameroon, & Ethiopia, were horrified: it's an unethical study

Not just following orders.

The CDC just re-opened a previously shelved study that would withhold the hepatitis B vaccine from children in Guinea-Bissau, despite decades of evidence showing it is safe and effective. This is a violation of human rights, using “science” to harm some of the most vulnerable people in the world.

Addressed this here...

More on the compromised mission at the National Science Foundation in my long-form post:

Just another normal day for an admin that proposed to slash NSF's FY27 budget in half & diverted more than $1.4B in research funds last year and is now hosting a New Golden Age of Science Summit at the Donald J. Trump Institute for Peace (formerly, the United States Institute for Peace).

Thoughts on the intersection of findings that the administration diverted $1.4B in NSF funds away from investigator-initiated research and today's New Golden Age of Science Summit showcasing the White House's preferred political priorities of what constitutes 'science'.