Massagué: "Science in Spain is in danger of extinction"

Front page, editorial and interview with IRB Barcelona’s adjunct director, Joan Massagué, in the newspaper La Vanguardia. In the interview, Massagué warns that "the government is insensibly wiping out science by depriving the country of an activity that generates wealth". Massagué trusts that this situation will be corrected because there is still time, and says "there are people, institutions and governments that are doing things right". He gives Catalonia as an example, with Andreu Mas-Colell and his team, who he believes "are fighting to keep afloat a system that has taken so much effort to build "; however, at the same time Massagué fears that "they will not be able to hold out much longer because of the budgetary pressure they are under ". He goes on to warn that "it is very difficult to build up a science system, it is easy to knock it down, and after it is extremely difficult to build it up again".

On the same page Massagué encourages young people with scientific vocation to devote themselves to science in spite of the current circumstances and reminds them that "times change rapidly "and that the situation may turn around in the not so distant future. Massagué expresses his conviction that "talent always finds its way and many of the greatest researchers have emerged in times of difficulty".

Read interview in La Vanguardia (front page Catalan and Spanish, PDF interview Spanish, and editorial Catalan and Spanish)
Link to La Vanguardia