Background: National Institutes of Health (NIH) and other federal funding resources are critical for research and advocacy, but may not be equitably allocated across cancers.
Methods: This study evaluated funding from the NIH and Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs (CDMRP) supporting lung, breast, colorectal, pancreatic, hepatobiliary, ovarian, cervical, endometrial and prostate cancers, leukemia, lymphoma and melanoma, from 2013-2022. The primary objectives were to assess for funding disparities across different cancers compared to their incidence
and mortality and across racial groups. We also determined if underfunding correlates with fewer clinical trials. Correlations between funding for each cancer and its incidence, mortality and number of clinical trials were analyzed using descriptive statistics and Pearson correlation coefficients (PCCs).
Results: Diseases with the largest combined NIH and CDMRP funding from 2013 - 2022 were breast ($8.36 billion), lung ($3.83 billion) and prostate ($3.61 billion) cancers. Those with the least funding were uterine ($435 million), cervical ($1.12 billion) and hepatobiliary ($1.13 billion) cancers. Cancer-specific NIH and CDMRP funding correlated well with incidence (PCC: 0.85) but was poorly aligned with mortality (PCC: 0.36). Cervical, ovarian, breast, leukemia and lymphoma were consistently well funded compared to their incidence and mortality rates while lung, colorectal, liver and uterine cancers were consistently underfunded. These data are summarized in the Table. Cancers with higher incidence among Black people were disproportionately underfunded. The amount of combined NIH and CDMRP funding for a particular cancer correlated well with the number of clinical trials in that disease (PCC: 0.76).
Conclusions: Federal cancer research funding aligns well with incidence but significantly underfunds cancers with higher mortality rates. Underfunding strongly correlates with fewer clinical trials, which impedes future advances in underfunded cancers that already have worse outcomes.
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Source: https://ascopubs.org/doi/pdf/10.1200/JCO.2025.43.16_suppl.11025
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