Year 2, Week 7
Feb 7-13, 2026 - with a paddle
Hello friends,
Hundreds of millions of gallons of sewage have poured into the Potomac river in the past month, exposing Maryland and Washington DC to staggering levels of pathogenic bacteria. The catastrophic failure began on January 17 and is now the worst wastewater spill in American history. This is not a metaphor, though it is unfortunately thematically suited for the news this week.
This was Year 2, Week 7. It’s noxious but we need to wade in.
What happened in science & higher ed
For my adult life, the federal government’s legal authority to address climate change has hinged on an EPA ruling that greenhouse gases threaten public health and welfare. That crucial ruling is referred to as the endangerment finding. Yesterday, the administration revoked it.1 The move will allow vehicle and power plant emission standards to be repealed, and the EPA’s press release perversely celebrates this “single largest deregulatory action in American history.” Take heart that this will be a rapid and robust legal brawl, and don’t forget that this is a surprisingly unpopular move.2
On Wednesday, the FDA reversed its course and refused to review the first mRNA flu vaccine, which is intended for older adults.3 The ostensible issue is whether comparing the new product to the standard flu shot is sufficient to establish efficacy and safety.4 This is just one part of a much larger story about reshaping public health policy and undermining trust and confidence. At the federal level, NIAID staff are ringing alarm bells over being forced to end biodefense and pandemic preparedness work. At the state level, despite our rapidly-intensifying measles problem,5 radical activists have launched a coordinated effort to overturn vaccination requirements for school children. Again, and it’s important to stress, these efforts do not reflect public opinion: overwhelming majorities of parents believe in the importance of polio and MMR vaccines.6 Public opinion does matter: major changes to HHS leadership are being ascribed to damage control before the midterms.7 But respected leaders, like NIAMS8 director Lindsey Criswell, are being forced out. That brings us down to only 11 permanent directors left standing of the 27 NIH institutes and centers.
The other bad news, quickly:
Despite Congressional budget approval, the OMB is withholding funding for science missions at NASA.9 NSF announced Thursday that it is handing over NCAR’s supercomputing facility to an unspecified third party. A common thread here is earth observation systems - data and modelling that we rely on to understand weather and climate.
Which reminds me to mention that we’re officially back in a (partial) government shutdown. FEMA hopes it has enough cash in its disaster relief fund to continue planned operations. And what are the chances of an unplanned disaster?
Further reporting on recent anomalies with the NSF flagship GRFP10 confirm that there are dozens of cases of arbitrary rejection-without-review, and that there is a pattern of selection against life sciences.
The administration has just sued Harvard again, this time for admissions data from its undergraduate, medical, and law schools.
The University of Texas is merging some of it ethnic and gender studies departments into a single entity.11
And finally, the latest release of Epstein emails continues to show just how many scientists and academics were undeterred by or eager to encourage the predatory abuse.
And what’s next
As I finished today’s rundown, I needed to remind myself to make space for the items that aren’t terrible. That latest $600 million in CDC funding the administration tried to withhold? It’s been temporarily protected by a judge. That’s good, but I’m even more grateful that the team at Grant Witness immediately stood up reporting and tracking infrastructure to support ground-truthing and information sharing. I remind myself that they are far from the only people I know who are in steady, sustained action.
I think about what it takes for a professional society to openly defy the federal government, for volunteer coalitions to preserve, protect, and expand access to public data, for faculty to officially organize,12 and for countless ordinary people to stand together in the face of brutal violence. They are not giving up.
When we talk about public health or climate justice or the importance of funding fundamental research, what we’re saying is that we want the world to be safer and better for everyone. We must recognize now that this is part of a long, bitter fight about so much more than science. It is our choice how we confront the ethnic cleansing, concentration camps, and murders. The choice may take everything from us, but we are not giving up either.
Liz
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In an announcement that was so saturated with lies that the AP published an entire story correcting the claims one-by-one. ↩
There’s no contest. American adults support regulating carbon dioxide as a pollutant by 3 to 1 majority. ↩
To be specific, Vinay Prasad personally overruled the team of FDA scientists, including the head of the vaccine office, who had determined the review should proceed. This is not the first time, either. In any case, the vaccine is already in regulatory review in Canada, Australia, and the European Union, and Moderna has the opportunity to appeal the decision here ↩
As opposed to the higher-dose used for people 65+. There’s also a noticeable spin happening in the headlines, with unnamed senior officials defending the decision, and positioning it as a “procedural rather than substantive.” For more, see the STAT team interview with the company’s president. ↩
The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) Regional Monitoring and Re-Verification Commission has called a meeting for mid-April, and it’s possible that the US will be stripped of its status as having eliminated measles. ↩
Feelings about flu and COVID vaccines diverge along partisan lines. ↩
Note, for example, the difference between the CDC acting director being “ousted” versus being made an ambassador. ↩
National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases ↩
Allegedly, this is just for ten business days, “but may be extended.” This story was first reported by Politico. NASA Watch has the memo that was sent to center CFOs. ↩
Graduate Research Fellowship Program ↩
There’s no word on layoffs yet, but the consolidation effectively reduces faculty power and funding opportunities for African and African Diaspora Studies, Mexican American and Latino Studies, and Women and Gender Studies and American Studies. The pointed restructuring is another example of how universities are caving to political pressure. ↩
For advocacy, if not collective bargaining. ↩
