At around midnight on Friday, March 1, the White House issued instructions to agencies on how to implement the across-the-board sequester cuts of 5.1% to nondefense discretionary accounts. However, as the instructions to agencies notes, “Because these cuts must be achieved over only seven months instead of 12, the effective percentage reductions will be approximately 13 percent for non-exempt defense programs and 9 percent for non-exempt nondefense programs.”
The full memo from the Office of Management and Budget can be found here: http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/memoranda/2013/m-13-06.pdf
At NIH, there will be some level of flexibility in the way each Institute manages the 5.1% over the remainder of the fiscal year. However, most researchers can expect that existing applications will only be funded at 90% of the expected amount, and new application for research will face untenably low chances of funding.
