Meredith Wadman

5 days ago | science.org | Meredith Wadman

Twenty years ago, when the painful viral disease chikungunya exploded on the Indian Ocean island of Réunion and sickened hundreds of thousands, doctors longed for a vaccine. Now the virus is surging again, causing 50,000 confirmed cases and 12 deaths on the island, a French department, and spreading on neighboring islands including Mauritius. This time a vaccine called Ixchiq is readily available.

1 week ago | science.org | Meredith Wadman |Jon Cohen |Jocelyn Kaiser

In a blow to many foreign medical researchers who rely on U.S. funding, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced yesterday that by the end of September, it will halt what are known as “foreign subawards,” in which U.S. researchers share their grant money with overseas collaborators.

2 weeks ago | science.org | Meredith Wadman

Vaccine scientists and medical leaders announced today they are launching an unprecedented initiative to react to vaccine misinformation and scientifically unfounded vaccine decisions by the U.S. government. The nascent Vaccine Integrity Project (VIP) is being spearheaded by the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP) at the University of Minnesota and funded by philanthropist Christy Walton, widow of an heir to the Walmart fortune.

3 weeks ago | science.org | Jocelyn Kaiser |Sara Reardon |Meredith Wadman

In what may foreshadow billions in further research funding cuts, President Donald Trump’s administration appears to be killing much, if not all, of a historic initiative that was the first, and is still the largest, National Institutes of Health (NIH) effort centered on the health needs of women.

3 weeks ago | science.org | Meredith Wadman

President Donald Trump’s administration wants to cut nearly in half the $47 billion budget of the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) and reorganize the agency’s 27 institutes and centers into just eight institutes, according to a leaked version of a near-final 2026 budget proposal obtained by Science. That plan, however, must pass muster with Congress—historically a strong bipartisan supporter of the agency—if it is to become reality.