The Association of American Cancer Institutes (AACI) remains strongly opposed to the indiscriminate firing of dedicated public servants across the federal government. We are deeply troubled by ongoing workforce reductions and plans to downsize the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) by terminating an additional 10,000 employees across HHS agencies, including the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
Reductions in force (RIF) have been underway for over a month across the federal government. In addition to their direct and immediate impact on workers, their families, and the U.S. economy, mass layoffs are harming millions of Americans who depend on essential government services. Cuts to the NIH and National Cancer Institute (NCI) workforce directly undermine progress in biomedical research, disrupting clinical trials and patient care for people with cancer.
Advances supported by federal investments in the NIH and NCI have led to a 34-percent increase in cancer survival from 1991 to 2022, while NIH- and NCI-supported screening and prevention efforts averted 4.75 million deaths from breast, cervical, colorectal, lung, and prostate cancers between 1975 and 2020. Further, analysis shows 99.4 percent of drugs or products approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration between 2010 and 2019 were a result of NIH-funded research. This progress—and the millions of lives it has saved—was made possible by federal employees.
AACI urges decisionmakers to swiftly restore the NIH and NCI workforce and funding for cancer research. The livelihoods—and lives—of millions of Americans are at stake.