1.   Senators settled on no growth, rather than outright cuts, for the NIH, and shrank their student aid cutback by two-thirds.

2.   States will try to use unspent funds at the end of each fiscal year as a buffer to lessen the shock of federal aid cutbacks, Scheppach said.

3.   Palestinians said Thursday they intended to ban top U.N. relief officials from entering their refugee camps in Lebanon to protest aid cutbacks.

4.   Germany, Italy and Canada also reported aid cutbacks and lower ratios, while Britain was the only in the Group to report a marginal icrease.