"January 22, 2026 2 min read Add Us On GoogleAdd SciAm The National Institutes of Health's move to end support for research using fetal human tissue is clearly a political decision, not a scientific one, one expert says By Dan Vergano edited by Claire Cameron National Institutes of Health director Jay Bhattacharya speaks at the National Conservatism Conference in Washington, D.C., in 2025."
"Dan Vergano edited by Claire Cameron National Institutes of Health director Jay Bhattacharya speaks at the National Conservatism Conference in Washington, D.C., in 2025. Join Our Community of Science Lovers!Sign Up for Our Free Daily Newsletter The U.S. National Institutes of Health is ending support for research using human fetal tissue. Agency chief Jay Bhattacharya said in a statement on Thursday"
The U.S. National Institutes of Health is ending support for research using human fetal tissue. Director Jay Bhattacharya said the decision was motivated by a need to cut costs and by the increasing availability of validated alternative technologies. The NIH's budget is nearly $48 billion, and in 2025 it spent $53 million on 77 projects that involved human fetal tissues. Those projects ranged from HIV studies to joint and tendon regeneration research to investigations into early human development. Health and Human Services press secretary Emily Hilliard cited Bhattacharya's statement and did not clarify whether ongoing projects will lose funding immediately. Human fetal tissues are defined as cells obtained from a dead human embryo or fetus after a spontaneous or induced abortion or stillbirth. Medical researchers have relied on such cells for decades for purposes including vaccine development and studying disease in humanized mice models.
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