September 18, 2026
GHTC responds to RFI on proposed changes to reporting outcomes from NIH Peer Review
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PATH/Christopher Nelson
GHTC submitted the below response to a request for information (RFI) on proposed changes to reporting outcomes from US National Institutes of Health (NIH) Peer Review, urging the agency to maintain a rigorous, transparent, and effective peer review process through any reforms to the process.
The Global Health Technologies Coalition (GHTC), a coalition of more than 50 nonprofit organizations, academic institutions, and aligned businesses working to accelerate the development and delivery of new drugs, vaccines, diagnostics, and other health technologies, is committed to ensuring the NIH sustains a strong, predictable environment for scientific discovery to advance global health research and development (R&D). GHTC supports NIH’s goal of ensuring funding decisions reflect the full substance of scientific peer review. If NIH moves toward broader categories for reporting review outcomes, it should ensure that qualitative feedback is sufficiently clear and actionable to help researchers understand the scientific strengths and weaknesses identified through peer review and, where appropriate, improve future applications.
Peer review enables global health R&D
NIH’s investments in early-stage biomedical research are critical for the global health R&D ecosystem. NIH support has helped advance more than 45 new global health technologies since 1999, including Lenacapavir for long-acting HIV prevention, monoclonal antibodies to treat Ebola, and new drugs to combat drug-resistant tuberculosis. The science leading to each of these transformative innovations moved through the NIH peer review process. For global health R&D, where promising discoveries often move through long and interconnected development pathways, GHTC’s primary interest is ensuring that NIH maintains a rigorous, predictable, and scientifically independent research environment that enables strong ideas to advance and researchers to continue improving the science.
Transparency for researchers
As NIH simultaneously implements a more flexible approach to funding decisions under the Unified Funding Strategy, transparency regarding how scientific merit is considered alongside programmatic priorities, portfolio needs, workforce considerations, and available resources will be important. Clear and consistently applied processes can help preserve confidence in the independence of scientific review while giving NIH appropriate flexibility to steward its research portfolio.
Researchers should be able to understand the substantive scientific feedback on their applications and use that feedback to inform future research and applications. Historically, scores, percentiles, and paylines have provided researchers with useful reference points in the review and funding process. If NIH moves away from this traditional system, the qualitative feedback provided through peer review becomes even more important. Written critiques and panel discussion summaries should provide researchers with sufficient information to understand the scientific strengths and weaknesses identified during review and assess whether and how to revise and resubmit an application.
Maintain scientific independence
Researchers and institutions have experienced significant changes to NIH funding policies, priorities, and grantmaking practices over the past year. Additional reforms should be implemented in a measured and thoughtful manner and clearly communicated to stakeholders to minimize unnecessary disruption to the research ecosystem.
As the peer review and funding processes evolve, NIH should continue to provide clear safeguards and transparency regarding the respective roles of scientific peer review and programmatic considerations in final funding decisions. Preserving confidence in the independence and integrity of peer review is essential to maintaining researcher participation and ensuring that NIH investments continue to support high-quality science. A rigorous, transparent, and effective peer review process will help ensure that NIH resources continue to support scientific discovery and that today’s research can become tomorrow’s health technologies.
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