How Trump health agency cuts could impact Alzheimer’s research and patients

As the Trump administration makes major cuts to federal health agencies, including the National Institutes of Health, some Alzheimer’s experts are worried about research for the brain-impairing disease being halted, which could impact treatment options and the lives of patients and their families.

The Alzheimer’s Association said last week that two related programs have had staff placed on administrative leave as part of the reductions: The Healthy Brain Initiative, which aims to improve understanding around brain health, and Building Our Largest Dementia (BOLD) Infrastructure for Alzheimer’s, which focuses on risk reduction as well as increasing detection and diagnosis.

These programs “have a meaningful impact on Americans everyday,” the organization said in a statement, adding that the BOLD program, as well as other Alzheimer’s programs, were just unanimously reauthorized by Congress last year.

The association’s president and CEO Joanne Pike said these public health programs are critical to those dealing with Alzheimer’s and dementia across the country. 

“Among other things, they ensure that people living with dementia, caregivers and health providers have the information, resources and support they need,” Pike said. “The programs remain intact, but continuing on a path of reducing staff and resources could cause irreversible damage.”

According to the nonprofit Alzheimer’s Impact Movement, federal funding for Alzheimer’s research accounts for as much as $3.8 billion each year.

“Reduced research funding means we are delaying the development and refinement of treatments that could delay or prevent the onset of dementia symptoms, reducing quality of life and increasing suffering for both patients and families,” Jason Krellman, a clinical neuropsychologist and assistant professor at Columbia University Irving Medical Center, told CBS News.

He says this is a crucial time for brain disease research, as drugs are being developed that show potential to treat the underlying causes of Alzheimer’s rather than just slowing its symptoms.

“Funding cuts will surely reduce or even stop the progress we are now starting to make toward cures for Alzheimer’s disease and related conditions. That is especially problematic because our population is aging more than ever before and these diseases will therefore become much more prevalent in the years to come,” he said. 

Cuts could threaten “the entire pipeline”

Lawrence Chernin, CEO and co-founder of Dabble Health, a company focused on cognitive health monitoring, worries funding cuts could leave potentially life-changing innovations behind. He and his team are developing an app that he hopes could give people a “cognitive score,” similar to health apps that give sleep scores — but further testing is needed for scientific validatation.

Despite promising data from a pilot study, Chernin said traditional investors often consider tools like theirs “too early and too risky.”

“Government funding through NIH and SBIR (Small Business Innovation Research) grants represents the only viable bridge from promising research to clinical validation,” he told CBS News, adding that his company recently applied for an SBIR grant. 

“Frankly, without this funding, our company may not survive,” he said. “These NIH cuts don’t just threaten our company; they threaten the entire pipeline of early-stage medical innovations that could transform Alzheimer’s care.”

SBIR helps fund the NIH’s National Institute of Aging, which makes nearly $150 million in grants to small businesses each year. According to the institute, it is the largest source of early-stage funding for aging-related research and development, including interventions for Alzheimer’s disease.

And while Chernin recognizes some people think there’s a lot of waste in government spending, he says “overall it achieves so much,” pointing to breakthroughs in cancer research, for example.

“Now, cancer isn’t as terrible, actually, in terms of the scope of diseases like Alzheimer’s is, because there are remedies for cancer,” he said.

Hoping for continued support

Some, however, like Dr. Joshua Hare, who is chairman and chief science officer at biotechnology company Longeveron, are optimistic. The company just successfully completed a Phase 2 study, published last month in Nature Medicine, for an Alzheimer’s medication they’ve been developing.

“Clearly, we have a president who is changing things big-time in all domains of our lives. … They want to cut funding and streamline the NIH, that’s clear, but I’m not at all convinced that they are anti-health,” he told CBS News. Hare said he thinks there will be more funding for areas consistent with the Make America Healthy Again initiative, Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s platform focusing on chronic disease, food additives and other priorities.

So while there will be cuts to certain areas — COVID and DEI-related initiatives are already being hit, for example — Hare said he’s not so worried about Alzheimer’s research being slashed. 

“I can’t say that for sure. I’m not in the government. I just listened to the testimony that the new director of NIH gave to Congress in his confirmation hearings, and he specifically addressed Alzheimer’s research, and he specifically said that there are avenues of research for Alzheimer’s that are underfunded and deserve ongoing funding.”

His company has previously received NIH funding for a non-Alzheimer’s, pediatrics-related trial, while the Alzheimer’s Association entirely funded the Phase 1 trial for Longeveron’s Alzheimer’s drug, Hare said. “If we didn’t have that extraordinary funding from Alzheimer’s Association and NIH, the company wouldn’t have had been able to progress to where we are now.” He said company remains “full steam ahead” on getting its product to those who “need it as quickly as possible.”

While the long-term impacts of the cuts remain unclear, Charles J. Fuschillo, Jr, president and CEO of the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America, said in a statement to CBS News that bipartisan cooperation is essential in the continued fight against Alzheimer’s disease. 

“We are grateful that federal policymakers in Congress and the White House worked together in a bipartisan manner over the last decade to deliver essential federal funding increases for Alzheimer’s research, and appropriately treated Alzheimer’s disease as a growing public health crisis, not a political issue,” the statement read. “Building on that progress is vital to ensure we reach the finish line of finding a cure for Alzheimer’s.”