1,900 Leading Scientists Sound Alarm on Trump Administration’s Attacks on Science and Public Health

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Speaking as individuals, about 1,900 elected members of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (The National Academies) released an open statement to the American people today, a “SOS to sound a clear warning: the nation’s scientific enterprise is being decimated.” The warning comes at a critical time for science and public health, as the Food and Drug Administration’s top vaccine regulator has been forced out and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. continues to consolidate his control over the department and advance an agenda full of misinformation and lies.

Public Citizen Health Research Group Director Dr. Robert Steinbrook issued the following statement:

“The nation’s scientific enterprise is being annihilated and the silence of too many of our scientific leaders is only making the ongoing catastrophe worse.

“The ‘SOS’ signal from 1,900 scientists must be a wake-up call for our leading scientific and medical organizations to show courage and speak out at this critical moment.

“If scientists and scientific and medical organizations will not forcefully speak out in defense of science and public health, who will? There is no alternative.”

Additional context on the letter: 

According to the statement: “The quest for truth—the mission of science—requires that scientists freely explore new questions and report their findings honestly, independent of special interests. The administration is engaging in censorship, destroying this independence.  It is using executive orders and financial threats to manipulate which studies are funded or published, how results are reported, and which data and research findings the public can access. The administration is blocking research on topics it finds objectionable, such as climate change, or that yields results it does not like, on topics ranging from vaccine safety to economic trends. A climate of fear has descended on the research community.”

Established by Congress in 1863 as a private nongovernmental institution, the mission of the National Academies is to “provide independent, objective advice to inform policy with evidence, spark progress and innovation, and confront challenging issues for the benefit of society.” The organization itself, however, has been silent about the Trump Administration’s attacks on science and public health. The signatories to the letter represent about 23% of the full membership of the National Academies and 41% of the members who were reached by the members’ campaign. Although many of the National Academies’ activities are requested and funded by Congress and federal agencies, the organization does not receive direct federal appropriations.