The future is here.
That phrase has been a theme at UNMC over the past year.
Our vision is to become a world-class academic health sciences center. We want to be known for “getting to the future first” in education, medical research, patient care and outreach to the underserved. UNMC has made great strides toward realizing this vision.
During this same period of time, we have been confronting a different kind of future. A threatening future created by an economic downturn. This future jeopardizes UNMC’s ability to:
- serve as an economic engine for the state by creating new high-tech jobs in biotechnology and biomedical research;
- build a critical mass of scientists that is essential to compete for research funding that enables us to discover new ways to prevent, cure or treat dreaded diseases;
- be accessible to train health professionals to address workforce shortages in this state;
- provide unique outreach services and training for Nebraska health professionals and citizens. We are the leader in rural health education in the United States.
In addition to the hope and relief that our research provides to courageous people who are suffering, I want to highlight the economic value of UNMC’s research enterprise to the state:
- Growth in our outside research funding fuels the economy with more jobs. This research generates high rates of return to the economy. One federal study estimated the rate of return from research to the local economy between 25 percent and 40 percent. Since 1997, UNMC’s research funding from external sources, mostly federal, has grown from $27 million to more than $59 million, and we’re shooting for the $100 million mark by 2005.
- The high-tech, high-paying jobs that are created keep our state’s best and brightest in Nebraska, preventing a “brain drain” that also drains the state’s economy.
- Improved and more effective treatments developed from our research have the potential to lessen the impact of rising health care costs. Already, our scientists have made important discoveries in transplantation, Alzheimer’s disease, heart failure, stroke, diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis and glaucoma, among other diseases.
- UNMC, working in collaboration with the state of Nebraska, has been recognized by Dr. D.A. Henderson, principal advisor to Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson, as the “poster child” for bioterrorism preparedness among academic health centers in the United States.
The research efforts of our sister campuses in the University of Nebraska also generate these benefits to our state.
UNMC has received tremendous community support from across the state. Private giving and investments in our initiatives are at an all-time high. Over the past five years, generous donors have gifted millions of dollars to UNMC. Many of those gifts were used to build the $77 million Durham Research Center, which is being constructed on the west edge of our Omaha campus.
Yet the state support we receive is critical to advance our mission and vision. Significant reductions to our state budget will be a setback. However, I believe that although UNMC may be less affordable and less accessible to our citizens, we will remain a vibrant and strong institution.
UNMC’s hard-working and competent faculty, staff and students will permit nothing less. Our bright future may be reconfigured if we have to sustain significant cuts, but we will refuse to allow it to be derailed.
Editor’s Note: This editorial has been sent to newspapers across the state.