Shelley Moore Capito Asks RFK Jr. How Clinical Trails Will Be Impacted Through HHS Reorganization Efforts

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During a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing prior to the Congressional recess, Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) questioned HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. about clinical trials.

Transcript

00:00I've run out of time. I yield back. Thank you. This is a fun game we're playing.

00:08Mr. Secretary, let's talk about clinical trials. Ask questions and don't give me a chance to answer

00:14them. Don't give me time to answer them. Well, maybe in some of my questions you can elaborate

00:20on some of that. I want to ask you about the clinical trials because she does have that up

00:23on her poster there. Clinical trials are the forefront of research, innovation, and oftentimes

00:30represent that last hope for cancer. Patients and other patients addressing chronic disease

00:36when traditional treatments have been effective. These clinical trials often lead to getting

00:40life-saving drugs to the market. Has HHS or any sub-agency assessed the impact of patient access

00:48to clinical trials through the reorganization effort? We are not cutting any clinical trials.

00:56We are not cutting any clinical trials. We're not cutting drug development. Cutting administrative

01:03costs. A question on indirect costs because, you know, this is a biggie. When it was announced

01:10that there was a, that NIH announced it would cap indirect costs at 15% for research. We talked

01:19about this actually in our meeting. We talked about the possible adverse effects of this.

01:24And like I've heard from West Virginia University, Marshall University, which received smaller amounts,

01:29but I've heard from everybody across the country in terms of the research. West Virginia University

01:34is a member of the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities. And they are working along

01:39with schools and independent research organizations across the country to come up with a new model

01:45for indirect costs. Are you aware of this effort? And have you met with them to discuss their work?

01:51I haven't met with them, but we are talking with lots of people about a new way to fund indirect costs.

01:56Are you aware of the, of the effort that's going on with a whole bunch of stakeholders that are trying

02:02to figure out a way to do this better? Yes, we are. And Jay Bhattacharya is very interested in this.

02:07And as you know, Senator, there was some of the private universities that were abusing that.

02:12We had Stanford, which has tens of billions of dollar endowment that was using our money. We,

02:19we wasted $9 billion last year of NIH's budget on, on indirect costs. We're paying some of these

02:26universities up to 78%. That money was not going to research, not all of it. In the, in the public

02:33universities, we are very much aware that those universities are using the money well, that we,

02:40that it is absolutely necessary for them. And we're looking at a series of different ways that we

02:46can fund those costs through them, but not through the independent, uh, indirect cost structure,

02:52which loses all control, which deprives us of all control of how that money is spent.

02:57Well, in my many conversations with a lot of the research, because I, I don't think anybody here

03:02wants to lead, uh, lose our valuable research. And I, I, I put you in that bucket as well. I do,

03:07I do know there's a recognition that there's not enough transparency, that the system needs to change.

03:12And so this group that's being put together, I think is very thoughtful in their approach.

03:17And I would encourage you as you've already done, uh, with the, uh, the head of NIH.

03:21Yeah. And I, I'm happy, Senator Capito, I, I could talk to you right now in detail about some of the

03:30alternatives that we are considering, but we are taking it seriously and we understand, but you know,

03:35in, in Maine at the University of Maine, the University of Alabama, many of these other state schools

03:43badly need this research. They're doing cutting edge research and they need that money that was

03:48going through indirect cause, but we think there's a better way to pay that out.

03:51Okay. Well, we want to work with you on that. Let me talk about rural health.

03:55I mentioned it in my opening statement. Uh, I know you've been to our state,

03:58so you understand the rural nature of many of our states. Uh, you know,

04:02there's such significant healthcare challenges in rural America. A lot of it around, uh, access,

04:07the rates of chronic conditions like diabetes and heart disease are among the highest in the country.

04:12In, in rural America, HRSA programs are critical to rural health and initiatives. Uh, and, and you've,

04:19uh, in your budget, uh, announced a cut to HRSA programs. Um, I am concerned about that because

04:28of the access issue and because of the, uh, inequities that I think I see. And I think we see sometimes

04:34between where people have easier access to healthcare than in rural America, you got transportation issues,

04:39you have connectivity issues, you have, um, just generational, uh, issues of passing down

04:45different diseases. What, how is rural America going to be better under your, um, uh, new reorganization?

04:52You know, there's a lot of ways, as you point out under HRSA, and this is a priority for me. It's one of the

04:58commitments I made. When I was doing my Senate confirmation, it was the issue that was most

05:05often raised by the various senators who I talked to. The, these, uh, facility, we're seeing the,

05:11you know, an epidemic of closures in rural hospitals, rural areas around the country. And the, the, uh,

05:18these not only provide critical access to care, if you don't have that hospital, people may have to

05:23drive two or three hours to get to a, a site. And that means people will die. They also are critical

05:30to the economy and the culture of rural America. They provide jobs and high paying jobs and they're

05:38economic drivers for those communities. So we're determined to keep them open and to do everything

05:42that we can to help them. And we're doing that through a combination of different ways under HRSA,

05:50through the community health care, health centers, the National Health Service Corps, which provides

05:57badly needed personnel, which is a huge deficit in rural areas. Uh, the GME program, which does education

06:05for those, uh, through rural health, but also through innovations like to provide better health care

06:11through telehealth and through, um, and through AI and through wearables and, and, and apps that can

06:19actually save people hospital trips. I spent two hours yesterday meeting with the, the CEOs of some of the

06:26the biggest and most effective, uh, health tech companies in the country and the potential that

06:33we have to transform rural health care. For me, I walked out of that meeting very, very optimistic and

06:38very excited about the capacity that we now have through technology and AI to transform, to save, to

06:47rescue rural health care around this country. Thank you very much. Senator Durbin. Thank you for being here.

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