Years ago I was invited to participate in an NIH focus group that sought researchers’ views about funding policies for immunology and infectious disease, which is mostly covered by the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Disease, or NIAID. When the meeting began, one researcher asked if the outsized levels of HIV funding were because NIAID Director Anthony Fauci’s background was in HIV. Others in the room immediately voiced their assent. Another researcher exclaimed that HIV’s funding dominance was “infuriating” for non-HIV researchers, which included almost everyone in the room. In response, the NIH representative shrugged, “That’s a lobbying issue and we don’t have any control over it.”
In 2019, $2 billion, over one-third of all NIAID funds, went to HIV research. In the following years, the surge in COVID funding reduced that to one-fourth (although still equaling $2 billion).