Fox News has apparently spent only about 20 minutes covering spending cuts to the National Institutes of Health since February 7, when the NIH announced a cap on indirect funding included in research grants. Of the 11 segments about the cuts, Media Matters found only 2 that mentioned the impact they would have on cancer research.

The Trump administration's recent attacks on the NIH have resulted in significant funding cuts, severely impacting cancer research across the country. The cuts include a drastic reduction in the reimbursement rate for indirect costs from an average of 27-28% to a proposed cap of 15%, potentially leading to billions of dollars in losses for research institutions. The funding cuts are affecting a wide range of programs, including precision therapy, quality of life studies, artificial intelligence applications in cancer research, and state clinical trial programs. 

Experts warn that these funding reductions could have severe consequences for cancer research and patient care. Some researchers fear that the cuts will lead to delayed discoveries, stalled clinical trials, and a potential exodus of talented scientists from the field, ultimately hindering progress in developing lifesaving treatments for cancer patients. 

Pediatric cancer research, which already receives less than 4% of all federal funds for cancer research, is particularly sensitive to these cuts:

Many universities rely on NIH reimbursements to maintain the kind of high-tech facilities and highly trained staff that are necessary to conduct clinical trials and other forms of medical research. Pediatric cancer research, in particular, is often expensive due to the relative rarity of many childhood cancers, the smaller number of patients able to participate in trials, and the need for specialized equipment capable of accommodating the physiology of small children.

“The proposed NIH funding cuts pose a significant threat to the future of pediatric cancer research and could severely impact the progress of life-saving treatments,” Danielle Fragalla, the Chief Executive Officer of Pediatric Cancer Research Foundation, said. “With research institutions facing multi-billion-dollar losses, the ability to fund new and ongoing studies–including those focused on childhood cancer, survivorship, and equitable care–could be drastically reduced.”

Despite these potential consequences, Fox News has seemingly almost completely ignored the impacts the NIH funding cuts would have on cancer research. From February 7, when the NIH announced a cap on indirect funding included in research grants, through March 12, Fox News spent a total of only about 20 minutes discussing the cuts. Of the 11 segments discussing the cuts, only 2 mentioned cancer research, accounting for about 3 minutes of coverage. In segments that weren't directly about NIH funding cuts, there were at least 3 additional passing mentions of cuts to cancer research, accounting for about 1 minute of coverage.

Of the 2 segments about NIH funding cuts that mention cancer research, 1 came from the network's left-leaning co-host of The Five, Jessica Tarlov, and the other came from a flippant comment by Fox host Brian Kilmeade in a segment obfuscating the topic. Tarlov was also responsible for one of the other three passing mentions about the funding.

While Fox spent the last month burying the Trump administration's cuts to the NIH and to cancer research, the network did have time to express outrage about some Democrats failing to stand for a pediatric cancer patient mentioned during Trump's congressional address. Just as the network highlights individual stories about cancer survivors, it ought to inform its viewers about the devastating impacts the Trump administration’s NIH funding cuts could have on the future of cancer research.

Media Matters searched transcripts in the SnapStream video database for all original programming on Fox News Channel for either of the terms “NIH” or “National Institutes of Health” or any of the terms “health,” “research,” or “agency” within close proximity to any of the terms “national,” “overhead,” “indirect,” or “15” or any variation of the terms “fund,” “grant,” “institute,” “spend,” or “cost” from February 7, 2025, when the National Institutes of Health announced a cap on indirect funding included in research grants, through March 12, 2025.

We timed segments, which we defined as instances when the planned funding cuts that would institute a cap on indirect costs for the National Institutes of Health were the stated topic of discussion or when we found significant discussion of the planned cuts. We defined significant discussion as instances when two or more speakers in a multitopic segment discussed the planned cuts with one another.

We also timed mentions, which we defined as instances when a single speaker in a segment on another topic mentioned the planned cuts without another speaker in the segment engaging with the comment, and teasers, which we defined as instances when the anchor or host promoted a segment about the planned cuts scheduled to air later in the broadcast.

We rounded all times to the nearest minute.

We then reviewed the identified segments, mentions, and teasers for whether any speaker mentioned the effect NIH funding cuts would have on cancer research.