US biomedical research funding doubles, with help from industry

© Anthony Foster

Funding for biomedical research in the United States jumped from $37.1 billion in 1994 to $94.3 billion in 2003, a doubling of support when adjusted for inflation, according to a recent study in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Private industry provided 57% of this total and the National Institutes of Health supplied 28%.

"We were surprised to find that the total numbers are as large as they are," says lead author Hamilton Moses III, chairman of the Alerion Institute, North Garden, Va. "No one before had pieced together all of what industry had spent." The study also validated previous reports that the emphasis of research is moving further down the pipeline, showing that a higher portion of funding is being dedicated to clinical studies. For instance, the percentage of research funding dedicated to clinical trials by industry increased from 28% in 1994 to 41%...