Sequestration will likely cut down on the amount of research being conducted at several facilities on the Buffalo-Niagara Medical Campus. And as WBFO's Chris Caya reports - that could slow the City's economic recovery.
Spending cuts being made across the board by Washington will reduce cancer research at Roswell Park Cancer Institute alone by $6-million.
The Hauptman-Woodward Medical Research Institute and the University at Buffalo will also get less.
UB Senior Associate Dean for Clinical and Translation Research Timothy Murphy says the budget cuts will have a wide-ranging effect.
"And one of the very important effects is on the future of our ability to train the next generation of researchers. If we lose several years of training people because they choose not to go into the field because of these devastating budget cuts, and the absence of funding to sustain their careers, we're going to lose an infrastructure that will take a long time to recover from," said Murphy.
Murphy said there will also be less money to recruit and hire scientists for the Medical Campus. Roswell Park Cancer Institute President and CEO Dr. Donald Trump points out research has had a positive effect locally.
"The scientists at Roswell Park in the last 10 years have spun off 8 small companies. Those companies are doing work parallel to what's going on in the labs at Roswell Park. And that growth can't be underestimated and ignored either," said Dr. Trump.
Representative Brian Higgins said a whole new economy has grown up in Buffalo out of the lifesciences.
But Higgins says first and foremost medical research saves lives - and he says Congress has failed the American public by allowing the cuts to take effect.
