Aisenberg et al. "Direct microglia replacement reveals pathologic and therapeutic contributions of brain macrophages to a monogenic neurological disease." Immunity. Online April 30, 2025. DOI: 10.1016/j.immuni.2025.03.019.
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The NIH director previously said, as part of a presentation to a meeting of the agency's outside advisers about the effort, that the NIH would be "developing national disease registries, including a new one for autism" to be integrated into a new "data platform" to study autism and other chronic diseases.
The HHS official did not say whether Bhattacharya initially misspoke or explain why his plan was reversed. Bhattacharya did not respond to a request for comment. HHS has not responded to a CBS News request for an interview with Bhattacharya about the registry.
Some $50 million will be invested in the research effort, which includes the data platform, the HHS official's statement said, which is "aimed at understanding the causes of ASD [autism spectrum disorder] and improving treatments by leveraging large-scale data resources and fostering cross-sector collaboration."
According to the official, the NIH still plans to explore partnerships with other federal agencies, including the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, "to facilitate a comprehensive real-world health dataset that maintains the highest standards of security and patient privacy while supporting research into autism and other areas such as chronic diseases."
In a statement to CBS News, the NIH said its "secure data repository" would "analyze large-scale, de-identified data" for autism and chronic diseases, similar to the agency's cancer database. The autism research would "be fully compliant" with federal privacy laws and regulations, the agency said.
"These efforts are not about tracking individuals. All NIH-managed databases follow the highest standards of security and privacy, with the protection of personal health information as a top priority," the NIH said.
The HHS statement marks the latest change to Kennedy's autism research effort in recent weeks, since he first announced the push at a White House meeting earlier this month.
Bhattacharya told reporters earlier this week that he anticipated grant funding for the autism research would "hopefully" be awarded by September. That is later than the initial timeline outlined by Kennedy, who has said that "by September, we will know what has caused the autism epidemic."
"It's hard to guarantee when science will make an advance. It depends on, you know, nature has its say," Bhattacharya has said.
Boston, MA—Maintaining a healthy diet rich in plant-based foods, with low to moderate intake of healthy animal-based foods and lower intake of ultra-processed foods, was linked to a higher likelihood of healthy aging—defined as reaching age 70 free of major chronic diseases and with cognitive, physical, and mental health maintained, according to a new study by researchers at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, University of Copenhagen, and University of Montreal. The study is among the first to examine multiple dietary patterns in midlife in relation to overall healthy aging.
“Studies have previously investigated dietary patterns in the context of specific diseases or how long people live. Ours takes a multifaceted view, asking, how does diet impact people’s ability to live independently and enjoy a good quality of life as they age?” said co-corresponding author Frank Hu, Fredrick J. Stare Professor of Nutrition and Epidemiology and chair of the Department of Nutrition at Harvard Chan School.
The study was published March 24 in Nature Medicine.
The researchers used data from the Nurses’ Health Study and the Health Professionals Follow-Up Study to examine the midlife diets and eventual health outcomes of more than 105,000 women and men ages 39-69 over the course of 30 years. Participants regularly completed dietary questionnaires, which the researchers scored on how well participants adhered to eight healthy dietary patterns: the Alternative Healthy Eating Index (AHEI), the Alternative Mediterranean Index (aMED), the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH), the Mediterranean-DASH Intervention for Neurodegenerative Delay (MIND), the healthful plant-based diet (hPDI), the Planetary Health Diet Index (PHDI), the empirically inflammatory dietary pattern (EDIP), and the empirical dietary index for hyperinsulinemia (EDIH). Each of these diets emphasizes high intake of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, unsaturated fats, nuts, and legumes, and some also include low to moderate intake of healthy animal-based foods such as fish and certain dairy products. The researchers also assessed participants’ intake of ultra-processed foods, which are industrially manufactured, often containing artificial ingredients, added sugars, sodium, and unhealthy fats.
The study found that 9,771 participants—9.3% of the study population—aged healthfully. Adhering to any one of the healthy dietary patterns was linked to overall healthy aging and its individual domains, including cognitive, physical, and mental health.
Source: website