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A federal judge on Monday vacated the Trump administration rule limiting which scientific studies the Environmental Protection Agency can use in crafting public health protections, overturning one of the last major actions taken by the agency before President Biden took office. The ruling by Judge Brian Morris, chief judge for the U.S. District Court for the District of Montana, Great Falls, marked a victory for environmental groups and public health advocates. Just two weeks before Biden’s inauguration, EPA finalized a rule requiring researchers to disclose the raw data involved in their public health studies before the agency could rely upon their conclusions. (Eilperin, 2/1)

Trump administration officials had billed it as a transparency measure and a way to combat "secret science." Opponents warned that it could hamstring the use of major health studies that keep their data under wraps for legitimate reasons including privacy. The rule didn’t eliminate the use of all studies with private data but gave preference to those with public data. An EPA spokesperson said in an email that the agency was "pleased" with the decision to vacate the rule. (Frazin, 2/1)

The decision saves President Joe Biden’s administration the significant time and resources it would have had to spend to unwind the Trump administration rule through a standard rulemaking process. (Gilmer, 2/1)

Were it not for the pandemic, combating cancer might have been Biden’s key health initiative. In 2016, as vice president, he launched the National Cancer Moonshot after his son Beau Biden died of brain cancer. That program—renamed Cancer Breakthroughs 2020 in 2017—pools resources to develop new therapies for various cancers. “There’s no question that there's going to be opportunities to build on that Cancer Moonshot initiative, especially with President Biden being in the office,” says Jon Retzlaff, chief policy officer and vice president of science policy and government affairs at the American Association for Cancer Research. While Congress has provided “wonderful support” for medical research over the past six years, he adds, the White House has not provided similar backing. “There’s no question that President Biden recognizes the importance of science,” Retzlaff says. “He understands cancer research better than any president we’ve ever had.” (Daley, 1/28)

Joe Biden’s presence at meetings of the Obama administration’s scientific advisory council sometimes tested his staff’s patience. It wasn’t that the vice president was unwelcome, of course. It was that Biden’s tendency to linger long after the meetings ended invariably caused scheduling hiccups. (Facher, 2/1)