US President Donald Trump’s ongoing efforts to reduce federal spending across government agencies have halted the development of a potentially life-saving heart pump designed for infants with congenital heart defects.
Although the Trump administration has been scaling back federal funding for medical research—particularly grants provided by the National Institutes of Health—the Department of Defense had stepped in to support vital research at Cornell University. This included funding clinical trials for the heart pump.
However, according to a report by the Cornell Chronicle on Tuesday, the Department of Defense initially approved a proposal to fund a four-year clinical trial. Just one week later, researchers were informed that the funding had been withdrawn.
Commenting on the setback, James Antaki, the Susan K. McAdam Professor of Heart Assist Technology at the Meinig School of Biomedical Engineering, Cornell Engineering, said: “Interruption of that funding has really brought us to a screeching halt.
“If the interruption lasts very long, it would be irreversible. We will have to start laying off people, and I don’t think we’d be able to recover.”
Antaki began developing the device—now called the PediaFlow—in 2002. He and his team had recently concluded a previous federal grant awarded in 2019, which was aimed at refining the technology.
The device, which is roughly the size of an AA battery, is intended to support blood circulation in infants born with severe heart defects.
