State budget cuts are having a trickle-down effect on the University, and this year its healthcare facilities will feel the impact.
The budget calls for a $15 million cut to the UNC School of Medicine and an $8 million cut to the University Cancer Research Fund, which is part of the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center.
The fund, which was created in 2007 with the opening of the N.C. Cancer Hospital, receives $50 million in state money each year.
But this year, the N.C. General Assembly removed the section of the budget that commits to $50 million annually, leaving the fund with an estimated $42 million. Dr. Shelton Earp, director of the Lineberger Center, said this amounts to a 16 percent cut for the fund. Earp said he is concerned this will significantly compromise the quality of the center’s work.
“Virtually everything that has been supported will be reduced to some extent.”
Earp said the cuts would reduce the number of projects the faculty could work on, including on drug development and genomics.
The center has recruited 140 faculty in the past five years — but retention will become increasingly difficult because of the budget cuts, he said. The cuts come as a result of a decrease in the state’s Tobacco Trust Fund, which is one of the main sources of funding for the Cancer Research Fund. Earp said the money will instead be shifted to the state’s general revenue fund.
He is also concerned that having reduced faculty and resources will make for stiff competition among hospitals nationwide for out-of-state funding. Last year, the Lineberger Center received $88 million in out-of-state funding — most of which came from the National Institutes of Health. Earp said faculty members are disappointed with the cuts, but he said he remains optimistic that the center will pull through.
“It’s our job to absorb these cuts and come out as strong as we possibly can,” he said.
