NIH/AHRQ/NIOSH released a notice on October 25th 2022 to extend the special exception for post-submission material due to COVID-19 pandemic (see NOT-OD-21-179; NOT-OD-22-047, NOT-OD-22-113) to include applications submitted for May 2023 Council (NOT-OD-23-006, which begins with applications submitted for the September 25, 2022 due date.
Notably, a one page update with preliminary data is now considered acceptable post-submission material. The deadline for submitting all post-submission materials, including preliminary data, will be 30 days before the study section meeting, unless otherwise specified in the FOA. Because applications for emergency competitive revisions and urgent competitive revisions undergo expedited review, post-submission materials will not be accepted for those applications.
Related COVID-19 Guidance from NIH includes, NOT-OD-23-008, which extends the guidance provided earlier (NOT-OD-22-112) that “Reviewers will continue to receive instructions to assume that constraints arising from the COVID-19 pandemic (e.g., lab occupancy restrictions, declines in patient accrual, etc.) will be resolved during the project period and thus should not affect their scores. NIH grant applications should NOT include contingency or recovery plans for problems resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. However, applicants may address effects due to the pandemic on productivity or other scoreable issues in their Personal Statement in the NIH Biosketch. Reviewers will be instructed to take these pandemic-related circumstances into account when assessing applicants’ productivity and other score-driving factors.”