Missed Opportunities in Public Health and Biomedical Research Act of 2020

[Congressional Bills 116th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 7544 Introduced in House (IH)]

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116th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 7544

  To amend the Public Health Service Act to require reporting by the 
  National Institutes of Health on requests for funding research that 
 were not granted and had the greatest potential for improving public 
                    health, and for other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                              July 9, 2020

 Mr. Lewis (for himself, Ms. Kelly of Illinois, Mr. Grijalva, and Ms. 
 Jackson Lee) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the 
                    Committee on Energy and Commerce

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
  To amend the Public Health Service Act to require reporting by the 
  National Institutes of Health on requests for funding research that 
 were not granted and had the greatest potential for improving public 
                    health, and for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Missed Opportunities in Public 
Health and Biomedical Research Act of 2020''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

    Congress finds the following:
            (1) Biomedical research sponsored by the National 
        Institutes of Health (refered to in this section as the 
        ``NIH'') provides numerous treatments and discoveries that 
        improve and save lives, defend the Nation against bioterrorism 
        and emerging pandemics, strengthen the national economy, and 
        support the next generation of researchers in the United 
        States.
            (2) While the NIH is the largest source of funding for 
        medical research in the world, the percentage of grants awarded 
        has fallen over the last 20 years.
            (3) The NIH Center for Scientific Review works with over 
        25,000 expert reviewers and applies the highest level of 
        scientific and ethical standards to almost 50,000 competitive 
        grant applications every year.
            (4) The NIH's peer review process is a time-tested and 
        proven method of identifying the most promising biomedical 
        research proposals.

SEC. 3. ANNUAL REPORTING BY NIH ON MISSED OPPORTUNITIES.

    The Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 201 et seq.) is amended by 
inserting after section 403D of such Act (42 U.S.C. 283a-3) the 
following:

``SEC. 403E. ANNUAL REPORTING ON MISSED OPPORTUNITIES.

    ``(a) In General.--Not later than the last day of the first fiscal 
quarter following the end of each fiscal year, the Director of NIH 
shall submit a report to Congress identifying, with respect to each 
national research institute, each national center, and the Office of 
the Director of NIH--
            ``(1) the success rate of research project grant 
        applications reviewed during such fiscal year;
            ``(2) the top two research project grant applications 
        reviewed during such fiscal year that were not funded; and
            ``(3) if the success rate described in paragraph (1) is 
        lower than 32 percent, the top research project grant 
        applications that were reviewed and could have been funded to 
        achieve a success rate of at least 32 percent.
    ``(b) Trade Secrets and Confidential Information; Researcher 
Names.--This section does not authorize the Secretary to disclose--
            ``(1) any information that is a trade secret or 
        confidential information subject to section 552(b)(4) of title 
        5, United States Code, or section 1905 of title 18, United 
        States Code; or
            ``(2) the names of the researchers proposed to carry out 
        research pursuant to unfunded research project grant 
        applications described in subsection (a).
    ``(c) Definitions.--In this section:
            ``(1) The term `success rate' means the percentage of 
        research project grant applications reviewed during the 
        respective fiscal year that received funding.
            ``(2) The term `top' means having the greatest potential 
        for--
                    ``(A) improving public health;
                    ``(B) advancing biomedical and behavioral research; 
                and
                    ``(C) increasing fundamental knowledge about the 
                nature and behavior of living systems, and the 
                application of that knowledge towards enhancing health, 
                lengthening life, and reducing illness and 
                disability.''.
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