COSSA has joined with its partner organizations and coalitions on several letters to Congress urging increased funding for social and behavioral science programs and sound scientific policies. Recent letters addressing fiscal year (FY) 2016 funding and scientific conference travel can be viewed here.

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On April 29, the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations released the second iteration of the Committee's 21st Century Cures bill (see Update, February 24, 2015).  The latest draft is a collaborative effort by Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI), Ranking Member Diana DeGette (D-CO), Energy and Commerce full committee Ranking Member Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ), Health Subcommittee Chairman Joe Pitts (R-PA), and Health Subcommittee Ranking Member Gene Green (D-TX).

The new version of the discussion draft would authorize the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for three years (FY 2016 through FY 2018), and increase its funding level by $1.5 billion each year.  It also creates an NIH Innovation Fund for FY 2016 through FY 2020, financed by a mandatory appropriation of $2 billion a year.  The Innovation Fund would be used to support precision medicine, young emerging investigators, and other priorities yet to be identified.

The section-by-section summary of the discussion draft is available online here.  A one-page summary is available online here.

The Census Bureau will retain several questions in the American Community Survey (ACS) originally identified for removal: Person Question No. 12, undergraduate field of degree, and Person Question Nos. 21-23, which are related to marital history. The questions were proposed for elimination as part of the Bureau's 2014 Content Review of the ACS and were released to the public for comment in the fall (see Update, November 3, 2014). COSSA objected to the removal of these questions in a written comment, as did many other organizations in the scientific community.

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In preparation for the 2015 White House Conference on Aging, the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and the Domestic Policy Council are seeking input on science and technology initiatives that can improve the quality of life for older Americans. Examples of such activities might include:

• Expanded university and industry research and development to address challenges associated with aging
• Educational programs that help designers create "person-centered" products and services for older Americans
• Efforts to promote an "innovation ecosystem" for older Americans, which might involve accelerators, incubators, well-designed incentive prizes, and mechanisms for researchers and entrepreneurs to get rapid feedback on their proposed solutions
• The identification of one or more Grand Challenges around aging - ambitious but achievable goals that would significantly improve the health, independence, and quality of life for older Americans.

More information about the request for input is available here. Responses can be submitted through this form by May 22. 

On April 28, National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Francis S. Collins announced the selection of Eliseo J. Pérez-Stable, M.D. as Director of the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIMHD).  He is expected to join NIH in September.

Currently at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF), Pérez-Stable is a professor of medicine, chief of the Division of General Internal Medicine, and director of the Center for Aging in Diverse Communities. He is also director of the UCSF Medical Effectiveness Research Center for Diverse Populations, which is addressing issues for African Americans, Asians, and Latinos in the areas of cancer, cardiovascular disease, and reproductive health.  His personal research interest is in improving the health of poor and minority patients, reducing health risks such as smoking in minority populations, and improving cross-cultural communication skills among health care professionals.

Announcing Pérez-Stable's appointment, Collins noted that "Eliseo is a highly respected leader with rich experience in advancing efforts to eliminate health disparities.  He has the passion and vision to guide the NIMHD research agenda in this critically important area."

Collins also recognized and thanked Acting NIMHD Director Yvonne T. Maddox for her "exemplary and dedicated service of leading the NIMHD efforts over the last year."  He also announced that Maddox is moving on to become Vice President for Research at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences. 

The National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIMHD) within the National Institutes of Health (NIH) serves as the focal point for the agency's conduct of research, research training, capacity-building, and outreach dissemination of minority health and health disparities. NIMHD recently initiated a scientific planning process in collaboration with the NIH institutes and centers designed to define a vision that will guide the development of "the science of health disparities research for the next decade and identify key research areas that should be given high priority because knowledge in those areas might inform translational efforts that could have a significant impact on reducing health disparities."

To that end, NIMHD has issued a time-sensitive request for information (RFI), Soliciting Input into the NIH Science Vision for Health Disparities Research (NOT-MD-15-006). The Institute is seeking conceptual input regarding the science vision for health disparities research. Comments are being specifically sought regarding key research areas that might address the complexity of the multiple, interacting factors that often generate and perpetuate health disparities.

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The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is seeking feedback from the scientific community via a Request for Information (RFI): NIH Precision Medicine Cohort (NOT-OD-15-096) to guide it in creating a longitudinal cohort of one million or more Americans who have volunteered to participate in research as part of the President's proposed Precision Medicine Initiative (PMI) (see Update, April 21, 2015).

Specifically, the agency is seeking information on characteristics, purpose, or other overall aspects in the development and implementation of a large U.S. precision medicine cohort. As participants in PMI, individuals will be asked to give consent for extensive characterization of biologic specimens and behavioral and environmental data, all linked to their electronic health records (EHRs). Qualified researchers will have access to the cohort's de-identified data for research and analysis.

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The American Psychological Association (APA), a COSSA governing member, held a Congressional briefing on April 29, in conjunction with the Coalition for National Science Funding (CNSF) Exhibition. The briefing featured Saul Kassin, Distinguished Professor of Psychology at John Jay College of Criminal Justice (also a COSSA member), who spoke about his research on false confessions. Kassin observed that it is often difficult for people to understand why someone would admit to a crime they did not commit. However, in his analysis of a database of convictions overturned by DNA evidence, Kassin found that more than a quarter of the wrongly convicted individuals had made a confession.

Kassin's talk was divided into two sections: "Why innocent people confess" and "Why confessions trump innocence." In the first section, he described some of the harrowing experiences of individuals who had been wrongly convicted after confessing and explained some of the factors that put suspects at risk of making a false confession. These include vulnerability of the suspect, interrogation tactics like lying about evidence or prolonging the interview, and suspects' belief that the fact their innocence will absolve them of charges, regardless of what they do or say during the police interrogation. In the second section of his talk, Kassin noted that for most people, a confession means that a person is guilty. However, few people can differentiate a false confession from a real one, and juries are overwhelmingly swayed by confessions-even in cases where they are told to disregard it. Furthermore, innocent people who have confessed are more likely to take a guilty plea than those who have not, because they know how strongly their confession will count against them in the courtroom.