A new study shows no correlation between race and research funding from the National Institutes of Health, challenging previous findings that the agency’s review processes favor white applicants.

“I like to use the analogy that if you don’t know exactly what’s causing the disease, but if you’re in medicine, you treat the symptoms,” said Donna K. Ginther, a University of Kansas professor of economics who served as the lead author of the original study. “If you look at the policies the NIH have announced, they’re treating the symptoms.”