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House passes bill to bolster drug development, streamline clinical testing
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By a 344-77 vote, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bipartisan bill today that will provide additional funding to the NIH and FDA while streamlining the development of new drugs and antibiotics.
Introduced by U.S. Reps. Fred Upton, R-Mich., chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee; and Diana DeGette, D-Colo.; the 21st Century Cures Act, H.R. 6, would provide the NIH with a mandatory $1.75 billion per year and the FDA $110 million per year, for 5 years. Additionally, the bill would increase the NIH loan repayment maximum to $50,000, allow for smaller human clinical trials of promising new antibiotics, and enable greater access to patient data for personalized medicine and targeted clinical trials.
“We believe that this is a really, tremendously important vote for the increased funding for NIH, which we think is absolutely critical for continuing to broaden our biomedical research enterprise,” Amanda Jezek, vice president of public policy and government relations for the Infectious Diseases Society of America, told Infectious Disease News.
“This is a critically important step in many directions ... but certainly I think we also need to continue working to tear down sequestration and allow the appropriate investment, not only in NIH but also CDC and our other public health agencies.”
The bill was unanimously advanced by the Energy and Commerce Committee in May, and now will move to the Senate for further approval. Other changes within the bill include the establishment of economic incentives for the development of treatments for rare diseases and conditions, as well as a clarification of regulatory paths for newly developed medical applications. —by Stephanie Viguers and Dave Muoio