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On a Friday evening in February, the National Institutes of Health announced it was dropping indirect-cost (IDC) rates on research grants to 15 percent. Guidance issued by the Office of the Director said it wanted to make U.S. medical research the best in the world by reducing “administrative overhead” to allowed increased spending on “direct scientific research costs”… and made it effective the following Monday. Implementation is paused pending full judicial review, but even if the courts deny this change policymakers could choose to revisit the issue.