NIH resumes funding for research to create more dangerous pathogens
By 
Rebecca Trager2018-01-05T13:51:00
US biomedical agency lifts three-year-old funding freeze on ‘gain-of-function’ studies
The US National Institutes of Health (NIH) has lifted what was supposed to be a temporary pause on federal funding of certain gain-of-function (GOF) studies that has been in place since October 2014. The agency will again support GOF experiments on influenza, SARS and MERS viruses. The NIH said this research area, which aims to make some pathogens more dangerous, is important to help identify, understand and develop effective countermeasures against rapidly evolving pathogens.