Trump’s permanent USAID cuts slam humanitarian programs worldwide: ‘We are being pushed off a cliff’
Trump’s permanent USAID cuts slam humanitarian programs worldwide: ‘We are being pushed off a cliff’
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) — The Trump administration’s decision to terminate 90% of USAID’s’ foreign aid contracts slammed humanitarian projects worldwide on Thursday, from a new hospital in troubled Haiti to the biggest HIV program on the planet in South Africa.
Health groups, non-governmental organizations and others who received money from the U.S. aid agency to do good work had been bracing for bad news since President Donald Trump’s executive order freezing the funding for a 90-day review on Jan. 20.
But even those who feared the worst were stunned by the extent of the permanent cuts announced Wednesday, barely a month into the review.
“We are being pushed off a cliff,” said Dr. Kate Rees, a public health specialist who works at one of the biggest NGOs fighting HIV in South Africa, the country worst affected by the disease. The NGO lost all its USAID grants, she said, when they were expecting their funding to be reduced.
Termination letters land worldwide
In the hours after the Trump administration announced it was cutting some $60 billion in funding, termination letters arrived at NGOs across the world. They advised that their programs providing life-saving assistance against hunger and disease and performing other humanitarian work were being ended.
The letters said that the programs were being defunded “for convenience and the interests of the U.S. government,” according to a person with knowledge of the content who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly on the issue.
The letters added that U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and an official acting as a deputy administrator of USAID “have determined your award is not aligned with Agency priorities and made a determination that continuing this program is not in the national interests,” according to the person.
Some 10,000 USAID contracts were ended, according to InterAction, an alliance of international and American NGOs.
“Women and children will go hungry, food will rot in warehouses while families starve, children will be born with HIV — among other tragedies,” InterAction said. “This needless suffering will not make America safer, stronger, or more prosperous. Rather, it will breed instability, migration, and desperation.”
Liz Schrayer, head of the U.S. Global Leadership Coalition, a non-profit that promotes U.S. diplomatic and humanitarian efforts, said that the Trump administration’s move would cede international influence to China, Russia and Iran. “The American people deserve a transparent accounting of what will be lost – on counterterror, global health, food security, and competition,” she said.
‘Appalled at the announcement’
Trump and advisor Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency have hit foreign aid harder and faster than almost any other target in their push to cut the size of the federal government. Both men say USAID projects advance a liberal agenda and are a waste of money.
The U.S. is by far the world’s biggest donor and NGOs in almost every corner of the world had feared over the last month for their programs and the impact cuts would have on millions of vulnerable people they help.
The International Rescue Committee, which works in some of the worst humanitarian crises, said the “widespread termination” of USAID funding could cut off help for millions of people and urged the U.S. administration to reconsider. The Danish Refugee Council said it was “appalled at the announcement from the U.S. government to terminate nearly all its aid contracts.”
The impact was felt immediately at grass-roots level in Haiti, the poorest country in the Western hemisphere and wracked by gang violence, hunger and disease.
A desperately needed new hospital which was opened last week in the western coastal town of Petit-Trou-de-Nippes by the Colorado-based nonprofit Locally Haiti lost funding and six jobs for doctors and nurses and 13 positions for community health workers have been eliminated.
“We have this new health center, and now significant staff has been cut as it’s opening,” said Wynn Walent, the organization’s executive director. “To see that being cut at this moment is incredibly dangerous.”
‘We will see lives lost’
Health experts have raised alarm over the future of extensive and long-running HIV programs in Africa, where USAID has helped fund the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief started by President George W. Bush in 2003.
PEPFAR is credited with saving millions of lives in Africa and more than 26 million lives globally, largely by helping people get antiretroviral treatment that keeps the virus in check and keeps them alive.
In South Africa, which runs the biggest HIV program in the world providing treatment to 5.5 million people with U.S. assistance, an alliance of health groups said the cuts were a crisis and people would die.
“We will see lives lost,” said professor Linda-Gail Bekker, director of the Desmond Tutu HIV Center. Among other work, the center oversaw studies that found a revolutionary new injectable drug can prevent HIV infections, but it has now lost USAID funding.
“We are going to see this epidemic walk back because of this,” Bekker said.
The health groups said the U.S. government had abandoned the most vulnerable people in South Africa and abroad.
Bekker said that they expected the Trump administration to target specific programs like those that offer treatment for gay men and sex workers, but were astonished at how almost every program was cut. She said they didn’t know of one HIV NGO or health center in South Africa that didn’t lose its USAID funding.
“This has been across the board,” she said. “This is programs for children, orphans, for young women and girls. It is not hyperbole that I predict a huge disaster … unless we can fill the gap.”
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AP writers Matthew Lee in Washington, Dánica Coto in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Monika Pronczuk in Dakar, Senegal, contributed to this report.
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More AP news on the Trump administration: https://apnews.com/hub/donald-trump
By GERALD IMRAY
Associated Press
