In Ezra Klein and Derik Thompson New book abundance – Which may have heard to They tell the story of Catalin Carico, the American -American scientist who eventually led his work to Merna Kovid vaccines.
When the research center where she was working in Hungary lost his government financing in the early eighties, Carico left her homeland, sold her car for 900 British pounds and sewing money in Teddy Bear her daughter, so her family had something to live on. Like countless researchers all over the world, she found her way to the country where the world had the best opportunity to find financing and support to enhance their work: America.
Tomson and Klein, one of the founders of Vox, uses mostly Karikó’s story to clarify the way it hinders risk hatred. Karikó was convinced that Marana could be harnessed for new types of treatments and vaccines, but she suffered from rejection after she was rejected by short grant makers at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Only when the roaming epidemic struck that the tremendous value of the work of Karikó was recently identified. the Frank vaccines have been preserved in the end It lives up to 20 million. He lives in only one year, and Carico won the Nobel Prize for Medicine In 2023.
Even before years of rejection in the American academic circles, if Carico could not migrate, she might not be in a position to increase her research in the first place. Perhaps we had not got the vaccines of the Merseuled Rana – or even if we had, they would have been the product of another nation, those that would have earned the benefits that eventually went to the United States.
Instead, Karikó is one of a long group of foreign scientists, with the support of the unparalleled university system in America and its government support, and the greatness that benefited from it and its country benefited from adoption. the The United States won more Nobel Awards in Science From any other country to a large extent, and Migrant scientists won more than a third of these awardsIt has increased only in recent years.
America has become a scientific vehicle not only because it has it Spend more than any other country in research and developmentBut since she made herself a magnet for global scientific talent, from the two stars researchers to humble scholars such as karikó. This, in turn, has been translated into a huge economic benefit. According to one of the study, the government -funded research and development was responsible for 25 percent of Productivity growth since the end of World War II.
The Trump administration is now destroying all of this through catastrophic financing discounts and fictitious immigration policies. The result will not be less than the act of national suicide.
This is what money for him
There was no shortage of covering the financing discounts demanded by the government efficiency department in Elon Musk from American science. The National Health Institutes announced in February that it will work Cut the indirect costs that it covers for academic researchWhich would lead to a reduction in about $ 4 billion in the budget of the National Institutes of Health about 50 billion dollars; More discounts have been announced Later. Hundreds of grants This go to search in the fields, the Trump administration appears to be controversial – like HIV – was directly canceled. Thousands of Government scholars in agencies Such as centers of control and prevention control and the Ministry of Health and Humanitarian Services have been launched. Universities are witnessing hundreds of millions in scholarships for scientific research threatened for campus policies.
This is very bad. The power of the absolute dollar has always been a major component of American scientific domination, as it returned to the massive progress in the country during World War II. (Despite the importance of geniuses like J His physicist Niles BohrTo convert the entire country into a nuclear material factory.) Universities have already resorted to Employment freezes to deal with discountsAnd some of them to cancel admission offers for doctoral students. Some young scientists may simply leave the field completely, and may steal us from the future karikós.
But there was already some success in returning to these cuts. Friday, federal judge The Trump administration has been prohibited from reducing financing One of the national health institutes to support academic research, although the ruling is almost certainly appealed. Even if funding is reduced, future departments can be restored, while alternative sources of money can be found in the period. What the Trump administration is doing with financing is a body blow to American science, but it should not be fatal.
What is happening with the immigration policy, however, is another matter completely.
The Trump administration has not hidden the fact that it intentionally targets foreign students in the United States who participated-sometimes only two ocean-in the pro-Palestinian protests. Mahmoud Khalil, a green card holder from Algeria, was a academic student at Columbia University, currently Sitting in reservation In Louisiana after his arrest by immigration and customs enforcement agents. Another international student, Rümeysa öztürk from the University of Tuffs, is arrested for deportation, apparently for the crime of participation in writing an opening newspaper that criticizes Israel’s actions in Gaza.
But these are just prominent cases. The New York Times reported this week that nearly 300 international students in universities around the United States have The visas have suddenly canceled and may face the deportation. (This number can be higher when reading this – every time you click the main address yesterday, the number of visas that have been canceled increased.) Reports on harassment and detention for foreigners The American border crossed legally, which adds to a state of fear of any non -citizenship.
A few hundred students may not look much, since the United States granted more than 400,000 consultations in 2024 alone. But the message from the administration, which also looks Social media is required for student visa applicants To obtain evidence of “hostile situations” towards America or Israel, it is clear: We do not want you here. Students and scholars listen.
In a conversation The magazine poll nature From more than 1,200 worlds In the United States, three quarters said they were thinking about leaving the country. This was particularly true for young scientists who are to be the next forefront of American research. Foreign scientists who may come to the United States for short -term conferences or jobs Remembering these plansFear – with the mind – they may end up within the ice detention facility. Other countries like China and Canada are already Conducting initiatives for scientists in the United StatesBecause they are smart enough to seize a chance when they see one. As a conversation Piece of opinion Times put itThe Trump administration’s actions, “may mean the demise of America as the strongest power of innovation in science, health and technology in the twenty -first century.”
Can they be replaced by American students? Do not bet on that.
In 2017, International students represent 54 percent of the master’s degree And 44 percent of the doctorate granted this year in STEM fields. For some important topics in particular, the ratio is higher: in 2019, 72 percent of Graduate students in computer science were international. At the same time, the number Americans born in born in STEM programs She remained stagnant. American students record lower Among their counterparts in 36 other educational systems in international mathematics tests in 2018, and only one in five American high school students associated with the college Ready for STEM courses at the college level.
Paying foreign scientists here and closing the door to those who will come to cause countless damage to the United States. Jeremy Newfield called from the Institute of Progress Employment of wonderful immigrant scholars for the United States The “secret component” in the American dynamic. A 2022 study found that immigrants represent 36 percent of Total innovation in the United States Since 1990, it has been measured by patents, while more than half of the American emerging American companies over the past twenty years You have an immigrant co -founder.
And now, it seems, we no longer want them anymore.
The boutique industry recently appeared in an attempt to understand the meaningless business of Trump and Musk. One theory is that Musk does what he often did in his companies: cutting things to the bones, then seized it as he sees what explodes.
This can succeed-Musk did not build millions of dollars such as Tesla and Spacex by chance-but this depends on the ability to see the effects of what is cut immediately, through the quick information notes episode. If Musk changes in a SpaceX missile and explodes, there is his answer.
But as Klein said on a modern podcast“The government has no very fast reactions.” This is especially true for a long -term thing like scientific financing and talent.
Catalin Carico came to the United States in 1985, but it has not yet been 35 years after 35 years since its real value as a scientist. We may not immediately feel the impact of fewer foreign scientists coming to the United States and staying here, but the effect is real. We will feel it when we see scientists in other countries who get the Nobel Awards, when China wears in vital areas such as Biotechnology Amnesty International, when we struggle to find people and ideas that can create the next world companies. We will feel it when America becomes just another country.
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