AAMC Letter to Senator Harkin
in Support of "Twenty-First Century Research Laboratories
Act"
April 26, 1999
The Honorable Tom Harkin
United States Senate
731 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515-1502
Dear Senator Harkin:
The Association of American Medical Colleges enthusiastically
endorses your "Twenty-First Century Research Laboratories
Act," which would reauthorize and expand the National Institutes
of Health's programs of competitive grants to institutions
to support the construction and renovation of research facilities
and the acquisition of state-of-the-art laboratory instrumentation.
The AAMC represents the nation's 125 accredited allopathic
medical schools, 400 of the major teaching hospitals and health
systems, and 86 academic and scientific societies representing
87,000 faculty.
Your legislation spotlights a critical component of this
nation's medical research effort that has been significantly
underfunded for the past nearly 30 years. Recent advances
in science, and the resulting plethora of new scientific opportunities,
have generated demand for new facilities that meet stringent
building and environmental protection codes, which continue
to evolve, as well as sophisticated (and expensive) shared
instruments. The funding of facilities construction and renovation
through a merit evaluation process is an attractive mechanism
for helping to support the considerable expansion and upgrading
of biomedical research plant capacity that will be essential
if a markedly increased NIH budget is to be expended to maximum
effect. As you know, a 1998 study by the National Science
Foundation found that 67 percent of medical schools reported
inadequate laboratory space for the medical sciences, and
70 percent reported inadequate space for the biological sciences.
At the same time, research equipment has rapidly increased
in sophistication, complexity, and power and greatly enables,
indeed, has become essential for, the conduct of the cutting-edge
research being performed at universities. For example, advanced
imaging technology utilizing Nuclear Magnetic Resonance or
Positron Emission Tomography allows detailed, non-invasive
study of molecular functions within living, active tissue
and has truly revolutionized research access to the normal
and diseased human brain. The Shared Instrumentation Grant,
which is administered by NIH's National Center for Research
Resources and has a $500,000 limit, has consistently been
underfunded. Currently, there are no mechanisms that provide
a significant share of financing for prohibitively expensive,
and increasingly commonplace, research equipment costing between
$1 million and $5 million.
The AAMC firmly believes that a reauthorized and adequately
funded facilities mechanism that is stringently merit evaluated
is an essential component of a balanced, forward-looking biomedical
research agenda. The Association commends you for your leadership
in introducing this legislation, and we stand ready to work
with you to ensure its enactment and funding.
Sincerely yours,
Jordan J. Cohen, M.D.
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