Headline Roundup • May 6th, 2025
Trump Signs Executive Order Limiting Gain of Function Research
Summary from the AllSides News Team
President Donald Trump signed an executive order Monday banning federal funding and increasing oversight for gain of function research.
The Details: The order directs the Office of Science and Technology Policy to pause research on pathogens that would be dangerous to Americans “until a safer, more enforceable, and transparent policy governing such research can be developed and implemented.” The new policies would end support for research it considers dangerous in countries like China and Iran.
For Context: Gain of function research involves enhancing the biological functions and transmissibility of pathogens to better predict emerging infectious diseases and develop vaccines. In 2014, federal funding for such experiments was stopped, a ban that was lifted during the first Trump administration in 2017. In his recent order, Trump said, “The Biden Administration allowed dangerous gain-of-function research with insufficient levels of oversight,” citing the research's potential contribution to the COVID-19 pandemic.
How The Media Covered It: Outlets on the left emphasized that a ban on gain of function research was lifted under Trump's first administration and that there is no scientific consensus that COVID-19 came from a lab leak. Outlets on the right did not mention that the original ban on federal funding was lifted under Trump and framed his recent order as protecting Americans. OAN (Right bias) linked COVID-19 to gain of function research, saying, “The White House recently unveiled a brand new COVID-19 webpage, explaining that the origin of COVID-19 likely came from the gain-of-function research lab in Wuhan, China… Dr. Anthony Fauci previously funneled over $1.4 million into the Wuhan Institute of Virology between 2014 and 2021 through the U.S. Agency for International Development.” It didn't mention agencies or experts who believe COVID-19 had natural origins.
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Featured Coverage of this Story
U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Monday that bans federal funding for gain-of-function research that typically enhances pathogens.
The order also paused any research using "infectious pathogens and toxins in the United States" that could be dangerous to citizens "until a safer, more enforceable, and transparent policy governing such research can be developed and implemented," according to a fact sheet released by the White House.
President Trump signed an executive order on Monday evening to further restrict experiments on pathogens and toxins that could make them more harmful.
For over a decade, scientists have debated the risks and benefits of so-called “gain of function” research. They’ve long tinkered with viruses and bacteria to endow them with new functions like producing insulin for people with diabetes. Some researchers have modified bird flu viruses in order to figure out which mutations might be crucial for producing pandemic strains that could spread among people.
Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Monday that effectively bans federal funding for gain-of-function research, which is now believed to be the catalyst of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the White House.
In relation to biosecurity threats, if a modified virus escapes a lab, such as what occurred prior to the COVID-19 virus spreading globally, it could cause yet another global pandemic. In addition to COVID-19, The H5N1 avian flu experiments in the early 2010s also alarmed many due to the creation of highly transmissible strains.
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