Joshua Weitz

New from #SCIMaP - analysis of the White House’s Proposed FY 2026 National Science Foundation Budget. Take-home: Slashing NSF by >50% will lead to ~$11 billion in economic loss and extensive job loss and reduced training opportunities in communities nationwide. Report: osf.io/e8rnc a 🧵

1000+ current and former HHS staff speak out: "Should he decline to resign, we call upon the President and U.S. Congress to appoint a new Sec. of HHS, one whose qualifications and experience ensure that health policy is informed by independent and unbiased peer-reviewed science." www.savehhs.org

“[Monarez] had two lines in the sand,” Besser said. “One was anything that was deemed illegal. And the second was anything that she felt flew in the face of science. And she says she was asked to do both of those.” Principled leadership matters. RFK Jr is unfit to serve as Secretary of HHS.

Super team of physicians, scientists, and public health experts come together with a single message: RFK must go. "It is time to reverse course and begin rebuilding the public health infrastructure overseen by CDC. Kennedy has proven himself unwilling and ill-prepared to lead that effort. " 👇

"We are a full fed family. This administration, during this shutdown, is about as anti-family as I have seen any public institution be" Strong reporting going beyond horse race framing into the real world consequences of shutting down government:

Delighted to host Mercedes Pascual at U of Maryland for the BEES seminar Nov 3, 12pm on "Hyperdiversity, frequency-dependent selection and tipping points in a host-pathogen system" (i.e., the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum). Mercedes directs the 🧉^2 lab at NYU. wp.nyu.edu/mercedespasc...

Wonder why Trump officials would want to leave their posts with 42 million soon to be without SNAP benefits while the administration focuses on gilded ballrooms, Argentinean bailouts, and the Binance founder's pardon... 🎁 www.nytimes.com/2025/10/28/u...

The title may appear obvious. Animals are 3D and behave... geometrically (!!!). But there is an epic debate going back ~80 years suggesting that metabolic rates scales like body size to the 3/4 and not 2/3 power (like surface area arguments would suggest). www.quantamagazine.org/shark-data-s...

Free from conflicts, they said. And gold standard.

Amidst a government shutdown in which the White House has proposed slashing federal support of science by billions of dollars, our #SCIMaP team continues to assess the impact of research cuts on communities nationwide. Learn more about our efforts: scienceimpacts.org With more to come... a 🧵

Precisely why it is time to speak up. There's plenty of room for more to explain where this is going and why it is essential we change course. www.statnews.com/2025/10/24/p...

In the past 10 years, CZI has given $7.2B or so to science. That's great. But, the White House has proposed *cutting* NIH's budget by $18B in FY 2026 alone. That's another level. Supporting a national network of health R&D requires sustained federal investment. scienceimpacts.org/fy26

"Put more plainly, broadening participation in and democratizing science is not a zero-sum enterprise"

"The newly appointed ACIP members appear to have limited or no experience as practitioners or policy makers for vaccine delivery; several are on record spreading vaccination falsehoods and are recognized antivaccination activists." & that was the point... www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...