NIH must better protect research from foreign influence, federal watchdog says

More than half of NIH-funded research institutions failed to provide financial conflict-of-interest information last year, according to a series of new reports from HHS’ inspector general. Foreign governments could profit from the lack of transparency when it comes to financial conflicts and could leave U.S. taxpayer-funded biomedical research vulnerable to outside influence or intellectual property theft, the reports conclude. They also say that the NIH conducted only three audits last year to check on institutions’ efforts to safeguard their own research, down from 28 such audits in 2012. The reports comes amid increased scrutiny on foreign influence on publicly funded research in the U.S. The NIH referred 16 allegations of “grant fraud” to the HHS inspector general this June, and the agency has said it has suspicions regarding as many as 250 researchers.