NIH grant review (secretly) paused

Having stayed up until 4 AM to prepare reviews for a Thursday study section, only to have it cancelled Wednesday at noon, I am feeling very frustrated. Anonymous sources say that since early February the program officers are receiving instructions to pretend that meetings will take place until the afternoon before, but that so far there have been no waivers to allow them.

No grant review means either no grants funded OR (conveniently) the normal rigorous grant review system is bypassed.

NIH is an agency within the Department of Health & Human Services (HHS). The word from people inside headquarters at HHS is that during the entire Biden administration grant awards were made, not on the basis of science, but based on "Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion" (DEI) policies implemented at HHS. In other words, HHS evaluated proposals for scientific research not based on the value of the research nor on the qualifications of the proposers to do the work but simply based on whether or not it qualified as adding DEI. The result was that many of people involved in evaluating the awards were close to quitting because too much falty science was being churned out wasting millions and millions of dollars. Every taxpayer should cheer this pause and understand its to stop wasting your money. Why? Because humanity desperately needs advances in science to be made in America given the competition we have from China and other adversaries. It is true, hopefully, that some of the bogus research grants will never receive any additional funding and will layoff staff. That is a very good thing. The money instead can be redirected to where the greatest return on investment of our tax dollars can be achieved. If the people being laid off have solid science skills they will easily find other projects to work on.