On December 7, 2017, Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) www.senate.gov introduced a bill cited as the “National Biomedical Research Act” (S.2212) https://www.congress.govv that would increase funding for targeted biomedical research initiatives.
The Act would create the Biomedical Innovation Fund, a new fund designed specifically to provide investments in life-saving biomedical research to be conducted by leading scientists. The funding would provide $5 billion annually in supplemental funding to help young scientists do breakthrough research on the underlying basis for disease and also address disease prevention, diagnosis, and treatments.
Specifically, research would be funded to do research on diseases or conditions where treatments exist but are inadequate which includes chronic and acute pain, research on diseases or conditions for which there are unmet medical needs, and research on diseases for which treatments exist but the side effects limit therapeutic potential.
In addition, research would be done to find new approaches to treat diseases using drugs, devices, or therapeutics that are either not used or are underused. Funding for new research would be conducted by experienced investigators with a history of productive and innovative research to enable these investigators to be more adventurous in their research techniques.