The Donald S. Fredrickson Papers

Title:: "Remarks to the NIH Community" [Thinking of the future]

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Transcript of Audio

Running Time:

2 minutes, 46 seconds

Date:

1981-06-19 (June 19, 1981)

Creator:

National Institutes of Health

Source:

"Remarks to the NIH Community." National Institutes of Health. 01:55:20:00 - 01:58:06:00 on DigiBeta tape.

"Remarks to the NIH Community" [Video] (June 19, 1981)

Rights:

This item is in the public domain. It may be used without permission.

Subject:

Medical Subject Headings (MeSH):: Budgets; Research Support; Ethics

Exhibit Category:

NIH Director, 1975-1981: Biomedical Research in a Time of Trial

Relation:

"Remarks to the NIH Community" [Reflecting on the past] (June 19, 1981)

"Remarks to the NIH Community" [Resignation announcement] (June 19, 1981)

Box Number:

Unique Identifier:

FFBBNJ

Document Type:

Speeches

Video recordings

Excerpts

Language:

English

Format:

image/jpeg

image/tif

video/quicktime

video/x-pn-realvideo

Physical Condition:

Good

Series: Audio-Visual Materials, 1978-1997

SubSeries: Visual Materials, 1978-1997

Folder: [Compiliation] Director's Award 1981 and Resignation 1981 Jun 19, 1981

Transcript:

DONALD S. FREDRICKSON: Let me speak of the future a moment. I think that the optimism that is so essential for success in science is as indelible as ever. The future will require more of us than in the past, it always does. It means we'll have to have sufficient flexibility, while sustaining the best traditions to adapt to level funding--level funding at best, perhaps for a few years, perhaps modest compression--as increases in the budget, which will come, may fail to meet the demands of inflation. I've already made references to adjustments of balances in the Intramural Program.

The next decade is going to test the Institutes as never before in terms of their corporate responsibilities. It must begin with aggregate budget distributions, and not end with them, as merely the sum of competitive independent programs, category by category. It's going to be a time of tough selection of priorities for funding by the different mechanisms that we have and possibly the creation of new ones for the future.

Especially, we're going to have to all show continued creativity and adaptation in continuous adjustment of the balance between categorical objectives "part of that genius of NIH" and the necessary communal provision of resources to maintain the strength of the institutions in which the majority of scientists in this country still work and teach.

We're going to have to have continued attention to the style, if that be morality, and to the substance of activities other than experimental work; activities by which NIH also merits high rating as a social institution. These include: continued provision of technical consensus and objective evaluation of technologies; education for both the providers and the recipients of health care so the changes in scientific knowledge and beneficially affect the lives of as many people as possible and the practices of the professionals. We're going to have to keep up that faithful curatorship of invaluable collections of data and the tangible collections of objects (cells, mutants, and what have you) which join us to proceeding generations and will join us to the future.

We're also going to have to maintain a rigorous defense of scientific ethic, and of scientific freedom, for they are inseparable.

Metadata Last Modified Date:

2007-03-14

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