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Medicine Government United States

America's NIH Scientists Have a Cancer Breakthrough. Layoffs are Delaying It. (msn.com) 216

Scientists "demonstrated a promising step toward using a person's own immune cells to fight gastrointestinal cancers" at America's National Institutes of Health (or NIH), reports the Washington Post.

But the results were published in Nature Medicine on Tuesday — "the same day the agency was hit with devastating layoffs..." The treatment approach is still early in its development; the personalized immunotherapy regimen shrank tumors in only about a quarter of the patients with colon, rectal and other GI cancers enrolled in a clinical trial. But a researcher who was not involved in the study called the results "remarkable" because they highlight a path to a frustratingly elusive goal in medicine — harnessing a person's own immune defenses to target common solid tumor cancers. Until now, cell-based immunotherapy has worked mainly on blood cancers, such as leukemia, but not the solid cancers that seed tumors in the breast, brain, lungs, pancreas and GI tract...

But the progress arrives at a sad time for science — and for patients, said the leader of the work, NIH immunotherapy pioneer Steven Rosenberg. Two patients' treatments using the experimental therapy had to be delayed because NIH's capacity to make personalized cell therapies has been slowed by the firing of highly skilled staff and by purchasing slowdowns. Those occurred even before major layoffs took place Tuesday... The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) responded to an email asking about clinical trial delays with a statement: "NIH and HHS are complying with President Trump's executive order."

It's "a very exciting study," said Patrick Hwu, president of the Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa. Finding ways to tailor this cell-based immunotherapy approach to common solid tumors that cause the vast majority of cancer deaths has remained a major scientific challenge... Rosenberg and colleagues first tried to create tumor infiltrating lymphocytes [or "TILs"] using the method that worked in melanoma for 18 patients with GI cancers that had spread. It failed completely. In a second iteration, his team sequenced the mutations present in each patient's tumor and used that information to sift out and expand the TILs that could home in on that patient's specific tumor cells. The results were far from a triumph, but provided a clue — this time, three of 39 patients' tumors shrank. In the last stage of the trial, the scientists added a drug called pembrolizumab that takes the brakes off immune cells. This time, eight of the 34 patients responded.

"Right now, only a few labs in the country can do what they just did," Hwu said.

While Rosenberg is already working "to refine and improve upon the results," he told the Post that two scientists involved in the specialized process of preparing the cells to treat patients were fired in the probationary purge. "We've had to slow down our work and delay the treatment of some patients...."

And there's also dramatically fewer people now who can purchase research materials, which the Post says it "making it slower and more difficult to obtain supplies."

America's NIH Scientists Have a Cancer Breakthrough. Layoffs are Delaying It.

Comments Filter:
  • by necro81 ( 917438 ) on Monday April 07, 2025 @08:03AM (#65286283) Journal
    I'm shocked (shocked!) that the guy who said he'd tear everything down with a wrecking ball, then set fire to the remains is doing exactly that.
    • I'm shocked (shocked!) that the guy who said he'd tear everything down with a wrecking ball, then set fire to the remains is doing exactly that.

      People didn't believe he'd actually do those things, though they believed him about lowering the cost of "groceries", etc..
      They only heard and believed what they wanted. Now they get what they actually voted for ...

      Donald Trump's Weird Definition Of "Groceries" Is Going Viral [buzzfeed.com]

  • by skam240 ( 789197 ) on Monday April 07, 2025 @08:10AM (#65286301)

    Yet even more evidence little to no thought is going into these layoffs. "Promising results towards a cure for cancer? Well that's just going to have to wait because layoffs".

    I'd have been in favor of an intelligent and thorough review of the bureaucracy followed by layoffs where appropriate but from what we've seen this administration has clearly skipped the review portion of the process and gone straight to layoffs. The Democrats are going to be left putting the pieces back together again for years after this and it will cost our country far more than any of these layoffs ever saved us.

    • by Entrope ( 68843 )

      To be precise, this researcher claims to have "demonstrated a promising step", not "results". They say that the voyage of a thousand miles begins with a single step, but so does a trip to the refrigerator for another beer.

    • They have a 300-page document called project 2025 with multiple pages about it. It's a government purge. They're using it to consolidate their power. It's part of a broader takeover of our entire culture and civilization. Next comes the theocracy.

      Basically they want to turn America into Saudi Arabia. A handful of kings and queens, a very tiny number of people serving them and a vast vast sea of extraordinarily poor people kept down by a combination of brutal violence and religion. All of it maintained
      • by poptix ( 78287 )

        We could have avoided all of this with a moderately warm meat sack with a (D) next to their name. I really hope the Democratic party gets their shit together.

    • by Tablizer ( 95088 )

      Trump could UNcure cancer on 5th Ave. and still win

  • "Breakthrough" (Score:2, Insightful)

    by eggstasy ( 458692 )

    I keep hearing about miracle breakthroughs whenever researchers need money but they never go into production.

    • NIH is in cahoots with the battery people, I'm sure of it.
    • That's correct. And from talking to someone who has had cancer, she had said that each so-called breakthrough is for a specific kind of cancer that does not translate over since each cancer is a unique thing that has different ways it forms. Radiation and chemo are the "poison the body and hope the cancer dies before the person does" approach.
    • See this CDC link for the breakthrough treatments on Hepatitis C. It used to be a terribly painful treatment with interferon. Now it's a simple drug that pretty much cures it: https://www.cdc.gov/hepatitis-... [cdc.gov]
    • Re:"Breakthrough" (Score:5, Informative)

      by werepants ( 1912634 ) on Monday April 07, 2025 @09:35AM (#65286561)

      Progress depends on the type of cancer, but overall research is making a substantial difference: Between 2000 and 2021, the cancer incidence rate per 100,000 people fell by 5.7%, while the mortality rate dropped by 27.5%. https://usafacts.org/articles/... [usafacts.org]

      Recent immunotherapies like this one really do look like breakthroughs that will accelerate that rate of improvement. For instance, 2 minutes of googling showed this one reduced or eliminated tumors in 82% of patients such that no further treatment was needed, and that's across several different types of tumor-based (solid) cancer like TFA refers to. https://www.cancer.gov/news-ev... [cancer.gov]

    • I keep hearing about cost savings and trimming the fat yet my grocery bill steadily climbs.

    • I keep hearing about miracle breakthroughs whenever researchers need money but they never go into production.

      WTF are you talking about. Miracle breakthroughs go into production all the time. Cancer is a really big field and we have made leaps and bounds in our ability to treat / cure people to the point where the typical approach to oncology is virtually incomparable to oncology of 10 years ago.

      Your odds of dying have been hugely diminished. You can thank the medical profession that they don't withhold the breakthrough treatments from non-believers.

    • You're getting skewered by the mods and comments somewhat unfairly, but your comment is also a bit unfair.

      What the NIH does is take risks; they spend money on things that are technically unknowns. THey can do that because the government can afford to whereas a private company might go out of business with risks like that. Once they find something that works and develops it, then companies can take over and bring them to market, which they're much better at than the government.

      Keytruda [wikipedia.org] is an example

  • by ArchieBunker ( 132337 ) on Monday April 07, 2025 @08:30AM (#65286351)

    Federal salaries make up 5% of the country's budget. https://www.marketplace.org/20... [marketplace.org] Musk is doing theater for the simple minded.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by sabbede ( 2678435 )
      And a penny saved is a penny earned.

      Complaining that what is being cut is too small a part of the budget to bother with means nothing will ever be cut.

      • And a penny saved is a penny earned.

        Complaining that what is being cut is too small a part of the budget to bother with means nothing will ever be cut.

        +5 Insightful. It's a shame that I have no moderation points left.

      • Do you honestly think you will somehow pay less taxes after all this? You're effectively paying higher taxes right now with tariffs on everything.

        • Ta-da! I just went to buy a new electronics part, yesterday, and DigiKey has a nice line-item feature in the billing that shows the exact amount you're paying for the tariff. So I get to pay 10% extra for absolutely nothing. Way to go, Trump/ers.
    • by gweihir ( 88907 )

      If it were only just theater, then it would not be so bad. What he is doing is massive damage that may not even be fixable anymore.

  • by rossdee ( 243626 )

    So the cure for cancer was Not Invented Here.

  • Two probationary employees were let go. The rest are up for renewal in 2025 and 2026. Is this really a "catastrophe" or just Washington Post and MSN spin?

    Layoffs suck but they have been a fact of life everywhere but the federal government. Now it's hitting them and they will have to manage like the rest of us in the private sector.

  • From looking at everyone's reaction to this, I wonder if maybe people might support a constitutional amendment to make funding research hospitals become one of the government's powers/responsibilities.

    Curing cancer, and many other health-related things, e.g. preventing spread of bird flu, are popular and people generally want that. Unfortunately, the constitution doesn't (at least not anywhere I can find) authorize the government to work on that.

    We could try hacks like calling it "interstate commerce" or

    • Congress explicitly has the power to do the postal service... and they've routinely fucked that up on purpose for small bribes with the goal of destroying it and ending their constitutional duty; which is inline with congress abdicating their power...

      Congress has all the power it needs already; the constitution primarily isn't an authorization document - it mostly is restrictions on government and everything NOT listed is fair game - you have it completely backwards. Go actually read it this time.

  • "I can save millions from dying!!" Nope, not going to let that happen.

    Remember, it's always easier to sell "hopelessness", it's human nature.
  • This is the latest move from the Washington establishment: fire 1,200 probationary employees and then blame DOGE for the layoffs. In reality, they’re either close to securing the next long-term funding boost or years away from a random development that will ensure someone remains on the pharmaceutical gravy train, despite the devastating side effects.
  • The federal budget deficit is blowing up to over 2.6 trillion dollars, heck it was 1.1 trillion for just the first 5 months of this fiscal year.
    Congress is a waste land when it comes to anyone doing their budgeting job and brain dead federal judges have taken control to stop any cuts or even fiscal responsibility at all at the federal level.
    The fiscal collapse of the US federal government is going to be epic and a disaster for the poor and the middle class.
    • by whitroth ( 9367 )

      Right... and Trump's tax cut in 2017 contributed massively. And the one he wants will bloat it beyond belief. Meanwhile, Tesla made $2B last year in the US... and paid ZERO in taxes.

      • Actually, due to the increase in economic activity, revenue to the US treasury increased with the 2017 tax cuts.
        The problem was, that increases in federal deficit spending exceeded the increase in federal revenue.
        The federal government does not have a revenue problem. The federal government has an out of control spending problem.
  • Who gets laid off doesn't come from Washington. That's a middle management decision. They are simply given a directive to reduce their headcount by a certain number or percentage. It's the middle managers who hand out the proverbial pink slips. Given that, clearly they had the choice to make. If they were rational people, then the decision hinged on which research would be the most beneficial. That may or may not be the case in this instance. On the surface, it sounds promising but so does a lot of o

    • by habig ( 12787 )

      In a normal layoff mode, that's true. But this particular set of layoffs started off with "everyone who was hired or promoted in the past two years, and thus "probationary" is out".

      So, the process started with a giant existing hole of anyone hired to meet some recent need, and also those who were doing well enough to have gotten promoted to a new position.

      That's irrationality from the top, long before surviving middle managers have to see how to execute their cuts on what remains and inject their own irrat

  • Mean Tangerine cuts funding for two probationary employees and suddenly it's "we cured cancer but we can't share it because of funding."

    I'd say it'll kill their credibility, but they don't have a whole lot left after deciding that after four months into a pandemic they went from "you want to kill grandma" to "this social cause is justification for large gatherings."

"Pascal is Pascal is Pascal is dog meat." -- M. Devine and P. Larson, Computer Science 340

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