Commentary: War On Science

As a young scientist, I spent 6 years working in a laboratory at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), first as a Fellow and subsequently as a Senior Investigator. My laboratory was just down the hall from Dr. Tony Fauci’s, who soon became Director of NIAID, a position he held for a record 38 years until his retirement in 2022. NIAID is the second-largest of the NIH institutes (second only to the National Cancer Institute) and had a 2024 budget of $6.5 billion, funding important basic and clinical research into infectious diseases, including influenza, COVID, HIV, measles, and Ebola, at universities and research institutes across the nation. My own laboratory relied on NIAID grant funding from 1978 until my retirement from Scripps Research Institute in 2016. So, it should be no surprise that I value the impact that NIAID has made on understanding and developing treatments for multiple infectious diseases. I am appalled at recent events directed at NIAID leadership in apparent retribution for Dr. Fauci’s actions during the COVID pandemic.

A recent issue of the journal Science reported a sad fact: “The NIAID currently faces a massive leadership vacuum, as the Trump administration has ousted or reassigned eight of its ten top leadership slots. Former acting director Jeffery Taubenberger stepped aside in May 2026, following the earlier firing of director Jeanne Marrazzo and the ousting of the institute’s top scientists.”

Many of the ousted leadership team were Fauci’s trainees, a fact that suggests an attack on his scientific legacy. No other NIH institute has faced such harsh measures.

Another recent issue of Science reported that: “The NIH’s highly regarded Vaccine Research Center (VRC) once had a roughly 400-person workforce that helped develop and clinically test vaccines and antibody treatments for Ebola and a host of dangerous infectious diseases. Now, after a steady firing of key contractors by President Donald Trump’s administration, VRC is reeling.” The VRC is a branch of NIAID.

We are watching a disaster unfold. Instead of preparing for current or future epidemics, this administration’s unqualified appointees are dismantling the institutions and expertise needed for us to prepare and, literally, to survive. These actions are pettiness wrapped in stupidity. We and our children and our grandchildren will suffer because of this madness. It is time to demand a return to sanity.