Public health needs. There, and as you mentioned, the public health urgency here is obvious, to all of us.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman for convening this important hearing and thank you, Dr. Hodes, Dr. Katz, Dr. Nabel, and Dr. Rodgers for joining us this morning to explore the needs of your various Institutes and the impact of the budget cuts…

it is not inappropriate to raise a question.

The funding for the migrant and seasonal farm workers program has been eliminated. Almost $80 million.

Shouldn't there be protections in place to protect workers, in case there is a pandemic? Shouldn't we be prepared.

Well, Madam Secretary, I can understand the problem of the backlog, especially when the funding for your Department is cut.

Why the repeated effort to eliminate that program when every time you do, both the House and Senate come back and insist on it?

I would emphasize that the increase in crime across the country, and especially juvenile crime, really underscores the need for those programs.

These cuts will be very, very difficult to sustain, given the issues which that funding addresses.

How are the allocations made, to have the $107 million, roughly, which is a very, very small part of the NIH budget?

Senator Harkin and I, and this committee--and I think, really, the whole Congress--are determined to increase funding so we can find an answer to autism.

Speaking of OSHA, why is the administration proposing to eliminate the $10 million OSHA program for worker training and education?

Health is our principal capital asset and the work which has been done by NIH has been truly spectacular.

Mr. Chairman, we have, on the floor at the moment, the legislation involving the U.S. attorneys who have been asked to resign.

Dr. Zerhouni, as you have testified, the deaths due to cancer have declined in the last 2 years.

So, it is the NIH research which has identified a way for early screening to treat cancer at an early stage.

Elimination of disease, and the suffering that goes with it, ought to be our primary concern.

Attitudes are changed in Washington, with political pressure.