The spending bill for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) calls for an overall 6 percent cut, or $7 billion below the current enacted levels. It's a far cry from the more than $30 billion the Trump administration floated in May.
The deadline for funding the government is Sept. 30, and the threat of a shutdown is looming as lawmakers are unlikely to finish a whole appropriations package. The Trump administration is also attempting to unilaterally claw back previously appropriated money, a legally questionable bid.
The House bill includes a cut of $1.7 billion from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, for a total of $7.4 billion for the next fiscal year.
The bill would provide $100 million for the administration’s Make America Healthy Again initiative, but it stopped short of the complete restructuring of HHS that would have created a new Administration for a Healthy America to focus on chronic disease prevention.
The bill does not include any mention of the new agency.
Still, the bill includes controversial policies slammed by Democrats, like eliminating funding for the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and eliminating the ability of HHS to fund harm reduction activities for substance abuse treatment disorders.
“Republicans are proposing cutting funding for the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,” said Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee. “They are slashing funding for State and local health departments, substance use prevention and treatment, and mental health services, and eliminating funding for tobacco prevention and HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment.”
The bill eliminates all $1 billion HIV prevention in the United States, according to the HIV+Hepatitis Policy Institute, while also cutting the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Care and Treatment Program by $525 million — including grants to more than 400 HIV/AIDS clinics providing care and treatment.
The bill includes a small overall cut to spending for the National Institutes of Health (NIH), about $465 million below last year’s level. But it comes as the Trump administration withholds hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of NIH grants.
Since President Trump took office, the NIH has terminated or frozen nearly 5,000 awards totaling $4 billion, while another approximately $15 billion has not yet been obligated.
The Supreme Court recently ruled that the Trump administration was allowed to cancel $783 million in NIH grants linked to diversity initiatives.
