This is a guest opinion column

As Congress confronts a deadline in early March to reach agreement on FY24 spending bills, failing to do so holds potential long-term risk for biomedical research at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the nation’s status as the world’s preeminent research enterprise. Without resolution, the work to discover lifechanging treatments for thousands of diseases and disorders will drastically decrease and sit idle for who knows how long. Genetic research plays a pivotal role in our understanding of disease and contributes novel approaches to cures. What we do know is that “stop and start” funding is bad for science, bad for the nation, and bad for families. The disruptions to genetic research help to explain why.

Thousands of my fellow scientists nationwide and I are at the forefront of understanding the genetic factors that contribute to major diseases such as cancer, heart disease, diabetes, rare diseases, and Alzheimer’s disease. Almost every American family has been affected by a life-threatening condition, and many have a painful story to tell about the impact on their lives. NIH is the leading — and sometimes only — source of funds for certain types of vitally important fundamental and translational research that may not be performed in the private sector or by other government agencies. In FY23, NIH’s 27 institutes and centers received more than $45 billion in federal funding, and the return on this spending to our communities was even larger. In fact, there is a return on investment for human genetics and genomics of more than 4.75:1. More than 84 percent of the NIH’s funding is awarded through over 50,000 competitive grants to more than 300,000 researchers at over 2,500 universities, medical schools, and other research institutions in every U.S. state, where these discoveries are advancing knowledge, changing lives, and seeding the innovations for economic growth.

This progress has depended on strong bipartisan support in Congress over decades that we must sustain, and genetic research offers the best examples of that impact. Over those decades, robust NIH investment fundamentally transformed our understanding of disease and today genetics sits at the forefront of health advances that are already having real-world clinical impact in understanding, diagnosing, treating, and even curing disease. Moreover, genetics is at the heart of an economic engine for the Birmingham region and the state of Alabama. A 2022 report found that the NIH contributed $385 million to the state through research grants and contracts, supporting up to 14,400 jobs at 21 research sites. The genetics field also has the potential to drive significant further growth in Alabama given major new areas of application.

But this progress isn’t a sure thing and our preeminence on a global level is no longer a given. After years of advances, many of the same voices that have threatened government shutdowns are also threatening huge cuts to NIH. Facing cuts, repeated risks of government shutdowns, and stop and start funding, the U.S. could confront slowed discovery and a very real danger of discouraging the world’s best and brightest researchers from choosing science as their careers and the U.S. as their home. Other countries would welcome these researchers as part of their own growing national research and innovation agendas; indeed, many nations have increased their own national research funding and recruitment in human genetics and in broader biomedical research. The result? We jeopardize not only the creation of new therapies but also the risk of losing a global leadership role that supports jobs not just in Alabama but throughout the country and multiple industries.

The American Journal of Human Genetics is marking its 75th anniversary this year and we will be highlighting some remarkable advances. Each one paved the way for those that followed, culminating in the sequencing of the human genome, the complete set of genetic information contained in each person’s DNA, and progress made in understanding the human genome. These accomplishments have led to major progress in elucidating the role that variation in DNA plays in health and disease, how to use this information for personalized care and precision health, and greater understanding of the role and function of genes in the human genome, their normal biological functions, and associations with diseases or traits.

We are on the cusp of a revolution started by the sequencing of the human genome and now countless breakthroughs in diagnostics and treatment, collaborations around the world, and better lives and new hope for millions of families. NIH-funded biomedical research is a major, indispensable catalyst behind all this progress. NIH needs sustained, robust investment, not shutdowns and we urge Congress to resolve the current stop-gap funding crisis and fully support the needs of biomedical research and the community it supports.

Bruce Korf, MD, PhD is the editor of the American Journal of Human Genetics and a professor and associate dean of genetics at the University of Alabama Birmingham. Dr. Korf’s opinions are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of his employer.