[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 216 (Wednesday, December 15, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Pages S9188-S9189]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                     Tribute to Dr. Francis Collins

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, it is a curious thing about tipping points 
in the quest for progress. Very often, the events that cleave history 
into ``before'' and ``after'' can seem insignificant when they happen. 
That might have been true 29 years ago, when the National Institutes of 
Health named a 42-year-old professor from the University of Michigan to 
direct one of NIH's newest cutting-edge institutes.
  The professor's name was Francis Collins. The New York Times' account 
of his arrival ran 117 words.
  His mission at NIH was to lead what we called then the Human Genome 
Project, an international quest to discover the genetic blueprint for 
human life. It was the scientific equivalent of the search for the Holy 
Grail. There were just as many skeptics as believers in that 
undertaking.
  But less than 6 years later, in June 2000, the first mapping of the 
human genome was complete. Overnight, that obscure professor from 
Michigan, Francis Collins, became one of the most famous scientists in 
the world.
  The decoding of the human genome was the achievement of a historic 
public-private partnership between the NIH's genome lab, headed by Dr. 
Collins and a private firm--a rival turned partner--founded by the 
genetic pioneer, Craig Venter. It involved hundreds of scientists from 
six nations. It remains one of the greatest advances in scientific 
knowledge in all of recorded history.
  In a White House ceremony announcing the first sequencing of the 
human genome, Dr. Collins said he was humbled and awed by the 
discovery. In his words: ``We have caught the first glimpses of our 
instruction book, previously known only to God.''
  Cracking the genetic code of human life has revolutionized science 
and medicine. It continues to yield profound medical discoveries all 
the time.
  That historic discovery could have been the capstone of any career in 
science, but for Francis Collins, there was an amazing second act to 
follow.
  In 2009, President Obama chose Francis Collins to lead the entire 
National Institutes of Health, the largest

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biomedical research agency in the world. In that capacity, Dr. Collins 
routinely works 100-hour weeks, oversees 18,000 Federal employees 
spread across 27 Institutes and Centers in 75 buildings--mainly in 
Bethesda, MD, but also in Baltimore, North Carolina, Arizona, and 
Montana.
  Those numbers only quantify the NIH infrastructure. Their actual work 
is even more impressive. In fiscal year 2020, the NIH awarded more than 
50,000 grants to more than 300,000 researchers working in universities 
and laboratories outside the NIH--in Illinois, in Minnesota, in 
Colorado, and virtually every State in the Nation.
  At the end of this month, after 12 years, Francis Collins is stepping 
down as NIH Director. Thankfully, he is not stepping away from science. 
In a signature Collins move, the doctor is going back to his research 
roots, back to head a laboratory at the NIH's Human Genome Institute, 
where he hopes to find treatments and cures for cystic fibrosis, 
diabetes, and other devastating illnesses.
  He has led NIH for 12 years under three Presidents, Democrat and 
Republican, making him the longest tenured head of the Agency since 
Presidents began selecting NIH heads 50 years ago.
  What distinguishes Francis Collins' tenure as NIH Director, however, 
is not its length but his extraordinary ambition and record of 
achievement. My friend former Senator Barbara Mikulski, who chaired 
once the Senate Appropriations Committee, famously said that the 
initials NIH should stand for the ``National Institutes of Hope.''
  As NIH Director, Francis Collins has worked tirelessly to live up to 
that ideal.
  As the Washington Post wrote, ``He brought together scientists across 
disciplines and championed the hunt for biomedical advances in troves 
of data. He gave meaning to the promise of big science.''
  He embraced ambitious projects such as the BRAIN Initiative, a 
collaborative effort to map the most complex organism on Earth, the 
human brain. It engaged engineers who had never worked on life sciences 
before, and it just might help unlock the mysteries of ALS, 
Alzheimer's, and other diseases of the brain.
  He launched the Cancer Moonshot with then-Vice President Joe Biden 
and played an integral role in helping to make now-President Joe 
Biden's dream of an Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health a 
reality.
  He created the ``All of Us'' Research Program, an effort to collect 
data about the genomic basis of disease from 1 million volunteers to 
advance our knowledge on how to cure it.
  He has been equally passionate about supporting the work of young 
scientists, including women and scientists of color. The absence of 
women researchers used to jokingly be referred to on research panels as 
``manels.'' In 2017, Francis Collins said that he would no longer speak 
at any conference in which women researchers were not featured.
  He made it a priority to minority scientists and to make sure NIH-
funded research addressed the health needs and historic concerns of 
communities of color.
  Nearly 7 years ago, I asked Dr. Collins: ``What does NIH need from 
Congress to continue to achieve breakthroughs you envision?''
  At that point, the NIH had seen flat funding for several years. 
Inflation had eroded the number of research ideas they could support, 
and many young researchers were really questioning whether they had any 
future at the Institution.
  Dr. Collins said simply: ``If you can provide steady, predictable 
increases to our budget of 5 percent real growth each year, we can 
light up the scoreboard.''
  I thought that sounded like a worthy goal so I enlisted my Senate 
friends Roy Blunt of Missouri, Patty Murray of Washington, and Lamar 
Alexander of Tennessee as partners. Senator Lindsey Graham and I came 
together and formed the bipartisan Senate NIH Caucus.
  With the determined leadership of Francis Collins and support of 
Senators from both sides of the aisle--listen to this--we have been 
able to increase funding for NIH by more than 40 percent over the last 
6 years.
  Some people say: Why should the taxpayers be paying for this 
research? Why not leave it to the free market; they make the money out 
of it.
  The answer is: The NIH funds the kinds of basic science that costs 
too much and takes too long for private companies driven by need for 
quarterly profits.
  One timely example: Years ago, a Hungarian-born American biochemist 
named Katalin Kariko had a hunch that messenger RNA--mRNA--could be 
used to instruct cells to make their own medicines or vaccines. The NIH 
funded this early research of this immigrant superstar when nobody else 
would. Last year, that research became the backbone of the Pfizer and 
Moderna COVID vaccines.
  One year ago yesterday, the first vaccine was administered, and more 
than 450 million shots have followed in America since then. The 
majority were mRNA vaccines.
  According to a new study released by the Commonwealth Fund, the 
American vaccination program prevented 1.1 million COVID deaths and 
prevented 10.3 million COVID hospitalizations last year. Vaccines save 
lives, and NIH taxpayer-funded research made these vaccines possible.
  There are millions of people who have never heard of Francis Collins, 
but they are alive and healthy today because of the Human Genome 
Project and his ambitious agenda at NIH as well as the talented 
scientists he nurtured.
  He is an American treasure, one of the most important scientists of 
our time. As Dr. Collins prepares to end his historic tenure as NIH 
Director and return to his lab, I want to thank him for his tireless 
work, his good humor, his good advice, and great friendship.
  I also want to thank his family, especially his wife Diane Baker, a 
genetic counselor herself, who volunteers at the NIH Children's Inn, 
where families stay while their sick kids are participating in clinical 
trials.
  And thanks to the thousands and thousands of dedicated researchers 
who have worked with Dr. Collins to realize his noble ambitions.
  Dr. Francis Collins, America is a better place thanks to your 
singular contribution to spare suffering and to cure the illnesses we 
face. I wish you many more happy years of discovery.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Smith). The Senator from Utah.