Obama seeks $215M for Precision Medicine Initiative

President Obama detailed plans on Friday for the Precision Medicine Initiative first announced in last week's State of the Union address. The FY16 budget request, due for release next Monday, will include $215 million to launch the initiative (see BioCentury Extra, Jan. 21).

The request will include $130 million for NIH to recruit a cohort of 1 million research volunteers and study their patient data. NIH's National Cancer Institute (NCI) would be allocated an additional $70 million to identify genomic drivers of cancer and seek new treatments. FDA would receive $10 million for database development, including developing a new approach for evaluating next-generation sequencing technologies. The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) would receive $5 million to develop standards for secure data exchange while guarding privacy. The Obama administration also aims to promote public-private partnerships to support the initiative. ...