NIH Announces Supplemental Funding Opportunity for Research on Novel Coronavirus

MUI
NIH recently released the “Notice of Special Interest (NOSI) regarding the Availability of Administrative Supplements and Urgent Competitive Revisions for Research on the 2019 Novel Coronavirus and the Behavioral and Social Sciences” ( NOT-OD-20-097 ). This NOSI highlights the urgent need for social, behavioral, economic, health communication, and epidemiologic research relevant to the 2019 novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) and COVID-19. The funding opportunity encourages researchers to add key social and behavioral questions related to the COVID-19 pandemic to existing longitudinal studies. Such questions might include those pertaining to adherence and transmission effects of various containment and mitigation efforts; the social, behavioral, and economic effects of these efforts; and the downstream health results of these effects, including differences in risk and resiliency based on sex, gender, race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and other social determinants of health.

Emphasizing the urgency of these research questions, ORWH Director Janine A. Clayton, M.D., stated, “The COVID-19 pandemic is highlighting existing inequalities in health care access and outcomes, heightening anxiety and depression, increasing the risk of violence against women and girls, and causing potential long-term consequences associated with trauma. Information from previous public health emergencies suggests that infection with this coronavirus will reveal variable effects on women and men with particular impact on populations in settings with limited resources.”

She added, “The news isn’t all dark. COVID-19 affords us an opportunity to marshal resources; center diverse voices, including leaders who are women and those from diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds; and coordinate research in ways that are more responsive to social determinants of health and health equity.”

Applications for NOT-OD-20-097 are now being accepted (through April 1, 2021), and more information is available here .

NIH has published a number of other funding opportunity announcements (FOAs) related to COVID-19 and is currently accepting applications.