MedCity morning read, Wednesday, April 8

Imagine if Ohio shut down its Third Frontier program? Or Indiana were to scuttle its 21st Century Fund?

The equivalent may happen in Washington, where Xconomy reports that the state will likely gut its 10-year, $350 million Life Science Discovery Fund. The fund usually gets about $65 million in the two-year allocation, but a Senate committee slashes that budget by 41 percent – down to $38 million. A House version leaves it just $5 million, using the rest to fill other holes in the state budget.

The state fund has delivered millions to researchers involved in vaccine research, cardiac care, drug delivery and other life-science technologies. “But it can’t claim to have discovered the next penicillin, and even in the best of times it would take years to show payoffs in new products, jobs, and regional prestige that such a program might be able to use to defend itself,” Xconomy notes.

Mental note to Midwest biotech recruiters: schedule trips to Washington.

Other stories worth a read:

• Psilos Seeks $450 Million Health Care Fund, Defying Crunch (Bloomberg)
• China faces $1.5bn software bill on healthcare, says IBM (Financial Times)
• Don’t forget about adult stem cells (Financial Times)
• Mercy Hospital plan for Ohio hospital hits a bump (Cincinnati Enquirer)
• Secular attack on NHS chaplaincy ‘simplistic’, says Unite (PR Newswire)