The US slashed research for cancer, Alzheimer’s, mental health — and nearly everything else

The National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. | Mark Wilson/Newsmakers via Getty Images

Think about the disease that worries you most — the one that runs in your family. Or maybe someone you love is living with it. Whether that’s cancer, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, or depression, odds are the US government has been funding the research to treat it.

That research is a big reason we have drugs that made fatal blood cancers survivable, treatments that turned HIV from a death sentence into something people live full lives with...