(Undark) – In May, U.S. officials terminated all NIH applications for grants with foreign subawards — the type of grant that applies to Wright’s work. The agency previously approved some 3,600 grants that awarded about $400 million to support researchers working at institutions outside the U.S. in fiscal year 2024. But now, as a Canadian researcher, Wright told Undark, his involvement in any U.S. grants to turn lariocidin into a viable drug are now a no-go.

His situation is perhaps reflective of broader trends in antibiotic research, and it may be poised to get worse. Earlier this year, 41 organizations pressed federal officials on the status of a meeting of the President’s Advisory Council on Combating Antibiotic Resistant Bacteria, which, so far, hasn’t happened. The Trump administration proposed $18 billion in cuts to the NIH. The primary agency funding antibiotic research and development, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases — one of 27 institutes and centers that make up the NIH — showed the single largest dollar amount of terminated grants. The NIH budget would be slashed by more than 40 percent. (Read More)