The Trump administration is reportedly considering ending a division within the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that is focused on funding HIV/AIDs prevention and treatment.
Even if Trump simply shifts the responsibilities of that division to another agency within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), it could result in fewer federal services, placing the burden of HIV/AIDS prevention on states at considerably higher costs, including for taxpayers.
The CDC currently provides states with funding to detect and respond to outbreaks, implement syringe exchange programs, expand HIV testing in emergency rooms, and conduct education programs and other prevention methods.
A federal official with knowledge of the administration’s thinking said that the plan is “not 100 percent going to happen,” but it’s “100 percent being discussed.”
Any changes to these programs could be catastrophic, reversing the recent trend of reduced rates of new HIV/AIDS diagnoses.
“It would be devastating. The work is important because every new HIV transmission results in a person having a lifetime cost related to being HIV positive,” said Jesse Milan, president and CEO of AIDS United.
In his 2019 State of the Union Address, President Donald Trump surprised many HIV/AIDS organizations and advocates by announcing a goal to effectively eradicate the virus within the U.S. by the year 2030. The results of his plan were undeniably positive: Rates of new HIV infections dropped by 30 percent in young people, and by 10 percent in other groups of people within three years of the announcement.
Since taking his second oath of office, however, many of Trump’s executive orders — particularly those targeting LGBTQ people — have detrimentally affected the cause.
“The success of the ‘Ending the HIV Epidemic’ initiative is in peril,” said Colleen Kelley, board chair of the nonprofit group HIV Medicine Association, speaking to Roll Call about the matter. “Not only will we not end the HIV epidemic with the current administration’s policies, we could reverse these gains and go back to the dark days of the ’80s, when people died from HIV every day.”
In an HIV + HEP Policy Institute press release, the organization said that it was willing to hear the administration out on its plans for tackling HIV/AIDS in the U.S. — but that any funding cuts could have dire consequences.
“If the administration has new ideas on how to conduct HIV prevention, including testing, surveillance, education and PrEP outreach, we are more than willing to discuss them…. But we cannot unilaterally cut the funding that Congress has appropriated and that states, local governments, and community-based organizations rely on to carry out their public health responsibilities to address HIV and other infectious diseases,” the organization said. “Without those federal resources, the number of new cases and the lifetime costs of treating them will just, sadly, multiply.”
The news that Trump is considering cutting funding dedicated to treating and preventing HIV/AIDS domestically comes as his administration has slashed funding for foreign programs with the same goal. Cuts to the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and other programs have included significant reductions in funding for the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) program, which has been credited with saving 26 million lives and preventing millions of HIV infections around the world.
Although PEPFAR wasn’t totally canceled, several of its major contracts were shrunken or cut completely, resulting in 20 million people — including 600,000 children — no longer receiving HIV/AIDS treatments globally. If the funding does not get restored quickly, it could result in a sixfold increase in HIV burden over the remainder of Trump’s presidency, experts have warned.
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