Experts warn about threat to global health while Trump freezes USAID

Global health experts express their dismay and concern about dismantling the United States International Development Agency (USAID), which distributes dozens of billions of dollars worth foreign assistance every year.

President Donald Trump’s administration has announced a huge decrease in the agency’s labor force and immediate suspension of almost all his assistance programs.

The US government has announced 90-day freezing funds for funding for help projects, while taking a “review” to ensure that they are aligned with President Trump’s priorities.

Trump is a long -term critic of foreign consumption and said he should be aligned with his “American First” strategy.

The administration was particularly targeting USAID, saying that the consumption of the agencies was completely inexplicable and distinguished certain projects as examples of the way the Agency, in its opinion, was the spending of taxpayers’ money.

Health experts, on the other hand, warned of the spread of the disease, as well as delays to the development of vaccines and new treatments as a result of a decrease.

As well as the direct management of many health programs, USAID fundes other organizations for performing jobs on his behalf, and freezing in financing has caused confusion among these groups.

The renunciation of funding freezing has been issued for some humanitarian programs, but the announcement has already caused wide services disorders.

Dr. Tom Wingfield, Tuberculosis Expert (TB) and Social Medicine at the British School of Tropical Medicine Liverpool, told the BBC that it is difficult to underestimate the impact of the decision to remove USAIDs.

“People do not value the scope and reach of USAIDs. It goes toward subjugation, hygiene, toilets, approaching clean water, which all have a huge impact on TB and diarrhea.

“Diseases do not respect the boundaries – this is even more the case where we have climate change and the mass movement of people. Infectious diseases will expand.”

Dr. Wingfield says TB kills 1.3 million people a year and makes up a further 10 million people.

But four out of 10 people never get care and therefore they can convey the disease, he said.

“Whether it is a research project or a hit clinic, then we risk further transmission.

“People will die directly for reducing in US financing.”

Not just the TB clinics, but those who provide care for people living with HIV.

Much of this paper is performed by non-governmental organizations, non-governmental organizations, which provide vital antiretroviral drugs that can suppress the amount of HIV in the blood to non-underlying levels, which helps prevent sexual transmission to other people.

Dr. Wingfield says that if treatment is disturbed, there may be serious problems.

“People with controlled HIV, if they miss drugs, a blood virus increases and there is a risk of transmission.

“There is a risk of canceling all the progress to this day.”

Frontline AIDS is an organization based in the UK and South Africa, which works with 60 partners in 100 countries.

More than 20 of their partners said they were influenced by the American side of freezing.

Communication over freezing and subsequent renunciation has caused “deep confusion,” the BBC organization said.

Many partners had to suspend HIV care, treatment and prevention of vulnerable children and adults and release staff, according to.

“Most remain in the recess, and this has a catastrophic impact on communities and organizations,” said John Plastow, Executive Director for Frontline AIDS.

He reported that one organization in Uganda announced that they would run out of their HIV tests, TB Condom drugs in a month, mostly funded by USAIDs for the AIDS President Emergency Cases Plan.

A large number of HIV services have stopped in South Africa. Some provide construction after care and ambulance for women and girls raped.

Professor Peter Taylor, Director of International Development Studies at Sussex University, said one of the biggest problems with Freeze was an erosion of trust.

“Stopping things suddenly undermines people’s trust. People are confused and angry,” he said.

“Underlocation of basic trust is the actual expense and this increases in many situations around the world.

“This is so harmful to the American global reputation.”

USAID also provides funding for key international clinical drug tests, which is prof. Thomas Jaki, the leader of the MRC biostistics unit at the University of Cambridge, could now be vulnerable.

“Unfortunately, there is a lot of trials that are immediately affected by the freezing of USAIDs – both in terms of initiating the experiments, but also the trials that have been set up and plan to start soon.”

He said he was “convinced” that American freezing financing “would be adversely affected by the development of treatment”, to the extent that exciting new treatments are delayed for years or even rejected.

“It is clear that impact on areas such as malaria and HIV will be particularly high because a significant part of the research in these areas is funded this way,” said Prof. Strong.

Profa Rosa Freedman, professor of international law, conflict and global development at Reading University, said that USAID provides up to 40% of the world’s development assistance, which covers health, as well as education and development of economic prosperity.

But health programs are where the impact of financing freezing – if it is extended or permanently – is likely to feel the most appropriate in the months to come, she warns.

“This will partially be a consequence of the prevention of further vaccines that USAID distributes or fundes.

“This could mean that the diseases that could be prevented, which we thought were contained or even eradicated, could re -appear or worsen, such as cholera and malaria.”

Profa Freedman said this could lead to an increase in health problems around the world.

“Given the globalized and interdependent nature of our planet, it will be concern that these diseases can be expanded quickly and far.”