The NIH is weighing changes to how grant review impact scores are disclosed to applicants, with a proposal to conceal numerical scores and replace them with broad tier buckets such as top 25%, competitive, and not discussed. The report describes expert and academic criticism focused on transparency and accountability in peer review. Under the proposed system, reviewers would still provide written critiques and criterion factor scores internally, but applicants would not see their impact score. Critics argue this could blur distinctions among applications and complicate program officer assessment of consensus. The report frames the proposal as the latest policy dispute around federal research funding mechanics, with transparency concerns central to the backlash. For the biotech and academic research ecosystem, changes to disclosure can affect how institutions plan grant strategy and how applicants interpret reviewer feedback when numerical scoring is removed.