Buy a bond, an NIH bond

Written byEdyta Zielinska

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The linkurl:NIH needs money,;http://www.the-scientist.com/news/display/49077/ and now, everyone can pitch in. If legislation proposed August 3 passes Congress, you will be able to buy a US Treasury bond and send 10% of the interest to the NIH institute of your choice. It may not seem like much, but US Rep. Steve Pearce (R-New Mexico) -- who co-sponsored the bill along with Emanuel Cleaver (D-Missouri) and Dan Burton (R-Illinois) -- noted that in fiscal year 2006, the Treasury Department redeemed $7.9 billion in interest on bonds. If 20% of those bonds had been "Healthy Bonds," as Pearce calls them, the NIH would have pocketed an extra $158 million. That's about 1/200th of the current NIH budget, but some scientists probably will take whatever they can get. The linkurl:Association of American Medical Colleges;http://www.aamc.org/advocacy/library/research/corres/2007/080707.pdf endorsed the bill, the "Americans Saving Through Health Research Bonds Act of 2007"(linkurl:H.R. 3434;http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:h.r.03434 ) on August 7. The bill has been referred to the House Ways and Means Committee for review. Jessica Carter, a spokesperson for Pearce, says that if it's passed, the Congressman hopes to use other lobbying groups to get the word out.

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