February 26, 2012

Dear Colleagues,


There is a petition on "We the People", a new feature on WhiteHouse.gov, that addresses concerns about the next year's federal support of NIH. I encourage you to please support this petition. If the petition gets 25,000 signatures by March 18, 2012, the White House will review it and respond!


You can view, register and sign the petition at the following website (it's free):


http://wh.gov/81O


Here's what the petition says:


Increase NIH spending to $33 billion! The proposed flat NIH budget will close labs nationwide, kill good-paying jobs, damage our worldwide medical research dominance, and hurt state economies. Of course, research performed by NIH-supported scientists around the country has also vastly improved our nation’s health! NIH jobs cannot be outsourced.  NIH funding created 350,000 jobs and contributed $50 billion to the national economy in 2007! Insource our jobs!!
 


Thank you.


Sincerely,

Phil Hockberger
Dept. of Physiology, Feinberg School of Medicine
and
Director of Core Facilities, Office for Research