what could happen if the US ends global health funding

The United States spent about $ 12 billion on global health in 2024. Without this annual spending, about 25 million people can die in the next 15 years, according to models that have estimated the effects of such deductions on tuberculosis, HIV, family planning and maternity and child health programs.

The United States has long been the largest donor for health initiatives in poorer countries, which is almost a quarter of all one -quarter of all health aid globally by donors. These investors have played a vital role in the continued public health benefits for more than a decade. For example, HIV casualties declined by 51 % globally between 2010 and 2023, and the death toll due to tuberculosis decreased by 23 % between 2015 and 2023.

But US President Donald Trump’s administration has reduced billions of dollars for global health, which includes abolishing the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and freezing foreign aid-some of which have been temporarily restored.

Researchers are trying to study the potential effects of funding deductions. John Stevers, an infectious damage to the Evan Health, a global health organization in Connecticut’s Glaston Berry, and his colleagues used mathematics models to evaluate health results, if US funds for global health should not be cut and replaced, if it was up to 2040.¹.

Researchers “Andrew Whelly, a clinical epidemologist at the New South Wales University in Sydney, Australia, says” strong, well -established and proven math models and analytical methods use a combination of “strong, well -established and proven mathematical models.” “Their searches are disastrous to read” and “a wake -up call for all of us in global health.”

James Trewier, a model of infectious disease at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, adds: “These models are probably as good as we are available to predict the direct effects of deductions on these various programs.”

On March 28, the US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, said the government was restoring its foreign auxiliary programs to be in accordance with the country’s priorities. “We are continuing to save life -saving programs and are making strategic investments that strengthen our partners and our country.”

HIV and AIDS

Researchers model the effects of cutting the US President’s emergency plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFar) in 55 countries, supporting it, which includes preventing transmission treatment, testing and providing intervention. The program funds have been affected by freezing.

Without Pepper, AIDS will have 15 million more deaths by 2040 if the program continues (see ‘a world without US aid’). More than 60 % of these deaths will be in six African countries, including Mozambique, Nigeria and Uganda. As a result of these AIDS deaths, about 14 million additional children will become orphans. This is a trend that will be expected in the next 15 years. And 26 million more people can be affected by HIV without Pepper.

The store says its effect depends on how much the country relies on the US government’s assistance. In Uganda, he says, for example, 65 % of HIV research is received from the United States. Some models partially estimated the effects of the financial support scenario. In this case, only continuing financial support for treatment can avoid 97 % additional mortality and 90 % additional HIV infection.

Tipious

The global number of infections of Mycobacterium tuberculosis – The germs that cause the world’s deadliest infectious disease – it is expected that it will increase even without financing US aid. Researchers have seen the impact of USAID and US partnerships in the World Fund to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria in 79 low and middle-income countries- although it is not yet clear that the US will shrink in this fund in the coming years. It will contribute to another 69 million M. Tuberculosis Infection and 2 million more deaths up to 2040.

Trivier says these estimates are widely compatible with other efforts to evaluate the effects.

“There has been tremendous progress in global health over the past two decades,” says Catherine Horton, a pandemic specialist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. “