Research and drug safety advocates expressed frustration at President Bush's budget plan for the 2006 fiscal year, which boosts funding for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) but leaves other biomedical agencies with marginal increases at best.

The new plan, released on 7 February, proposes an overall cut in federal spending on science and technology by 1.4 percent, reflecting government attempts to rein in a budget deficit and bankroll the Iraq war. Advocacy groups say these reductions could chill medical and public health research and disease prevention services.

Under the new budget, the FDA would receive a 4.4 percent funding increase, or around $80 million. Of this, $6.5 million is earmarked for hiring new workers to monitor safety of drugs and medical devices in the Center for Drug Evaluation's Office of Drug Safety. This division has come under fire in recent months for not taking a more aggressive stance over emerging signs of side effects from antidepressants and arthritis drugs including Vioxx.

The FDA also announced in February that it would establish an advisory board of federal scientists to oversee the safety of drugs already on the market.

Some experts say the agency will need a far bigger cash injection if it is to adequately address drug safety concerns. “The new budget additions are OK for this year, but no one should assume that fixes the problem,” says Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association in Washington, D.C.

Public health advocates also expressed concern about the proposed six percent cut, to $6.9 billion, in the budget of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), one of the biggest reductions proposed for the federal science agencies.

Many of the CDC cuts would affect disease prevention programs such as those fighting obesity and HIV, which some say is a shortsighted move that will ultimately create higher medical bills. “Decimation of prevention programs is particularly devastating,” says Bill Leinweber, head of research advocacy group ResearchAmerica in Alexandria, Virginia.

The budget proposes a 0.7 percent increase for the National Institutes of Health, one that fails to match the estimated 3.5 percent needed to cover the rising costs of equipment and staff in biomedical research.

Science advocacy groups say that members of Congress, who must approve the new budget before it comes into effect, are likely to reject many of the proposed cuts for health and science agencies. “We're concerned the budget for the NIH will not sustain current research programs—and we'll work hard to get that message to Congress,” says Jon Retzlaff, legislative director for the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology based in Bethesda, Maryland.