Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the Minister of Health of the Nation, said the treatment of a chronic “epidemic” disease would be a cornerstone of the American hygiene agenda and often citing alarming statistics as an urgent reason for this country.
On Friday, President Trump published a proposed budget that requested the cutting of funding of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention by almost half. Its chronic diseases center was fully planned for eliminating, a proposal that came as a shock to many state and city officials.
“Most Americans have some illness that could be considered chronic,” said Dr. Matifadza Hlatshwayo Davis, Health Director for St. Louis.
From the proposed cuts, he said, “How do you reconcile it with the attempt to make America healthy again?”
The Federal Health Department last month reduced 2,400 jobs from the CDC, whose national center for the prevention and promotion of health runs on the organization’s largest budget.
Programs for lead poisoning, smoking cessation and reproductive health were launched in reorganization last month.
Overall, the proposed budget will reduce CDC funding to about $ 4 billion, compared to $ 9.2 billion in 2024.
The budget plan makes no reference to the $ 1.2 billion prevention and public health fund. If this number is taken into account, the cut may be even greater than Mr Trump’s proposal.
The Agency will also lose a center that focuses on preventing injuries, including those caused by firearms, as well as HIV surveillance programs and grants to help states prepare for emergency emergencies for public health.
According to the proposed budget, cuts are required to eliminate “double, dei or simply unnecessary programs”. Congress records the federal budget, but given the democratic majority and its solvency to Mr Trump, it is not clear how much its proposal will change.
CDC officials had been informed that the functions of the Center for Chronic Disease would move to a new organization in the Department of Health called Administration for a healthy America.
And the proposal released on Friday seems to have $ 500 million to the Health Secretary in part “to tackle nutrition, physical activity, healthy lifestyle, overload of drugs and treatments”.
But in CDC, the budget of the chronic center of the disease was almost three times. And even if part of the center of chronic disease is rejuvenated to AHA, it is unlikely that the new repetition includes the CDC scientists transferred from Atlanta.
“The real experts in the object, who manage the programs, may no longer exist in the CDC,” said Dr. Scott Harris, a health officer at the Alabama Public Health Department. “We certainly do not have the same level of expertise in my state.”
The Ministry of Health and Human Services did not respond to a request for comments.
The CDC chronic disease center ran programs aimed at preventing cancer, heart disease, diabetes, epilepsy and Alzheimer’s disease. But the Center has also sowing further initiatives, ranging from the creation of rural and urban hiking trails to ensure that healthy choices such as salads at airports are offered. He also promoted wellness programs in marginalized communities.
Dr. Davis, Health Manager at St. Louis said that its section was already unfolding from programs to reduce smoking and reduce lead poisoning and health inequalities, as well as the cancellation of more than $ 11 billion that the CDC had provided to the State Departments.
“I would take the Covid -9 back on a heartbeat for what’s going on now,” Dr. Davis said.
In the proposed budget, the administration suggested that the programs that are eliminated would better manage the States. However, state health departments are already managing most chronic illness programs and three -quarters of CDC Center funding go to support them.
The loss of these funds “would be devastating to us,” said Dr. Harris, a health officer in Alabama.
The state has one of the highest rates of chronic diseases in the country and about 84 % of the Ministry of Public Health budget comes from the CDC, Dr. Harris said. About $ 6 million go to chronic illness programs, including examining blood pressure, dietary training for diabetes and promoting physical activity.
If these funds were cut, “I am in a loss right now to tell you where it will come from,” he added. “It just seems that no one really knows what to expect, and we don’t really ask us for a contribution to it.”
The renowned Minnesota Ministry of Health has already fired 140 employees and hundreds more may be affected if it loses more funding from the CDC. Cuts in chronic disease prevention will affect nursing homes, vaccines and public health initiatives for indigenous Americans in the state.
“The actions of the federal government have left us out on a thin end without safety net under us,” said Dr. Brooke Cunningham, state health commissioner.
Until recently, “there was a common understanding in the local, state and federal level that health was important to invest,” said Dr. Cunningham.
CDC’s CDC project of CDC Touchs Touches American lives in many unexpected ways.
At Prairie Village, Kan., Stephanie Barr learned about the center 15 years ago, when she worked as a waitress without health insurance, she discovered a piece on the breast of lemon size.
Through the National CDC Cancer Detection Program, she was able to get mammography and ultrasound and her staff members helped enroll in Medicaid for treatment after a biopsy that stipulates that the piece was malignant, Ms Barr said.
“It was caught in the nickname of time,” said Ms Barr, now 45 and free from cancer.
Since the program began in 1991, it has provided more than 16.3 million promotion tests to more than 6.3 million people without any other accessible access, said Lisa Lacasse, president of the American Cancer Cancer Network.
The Agency is one of the 530 health correlations that signed a report by asking legislators to reject the proposed HHS budget, which reduces discreet costs by about one -third. Signatories have said the cuts would “effectively” destroy the research of the nation’s research and public health.
The budget also proposes the disassembly of the registers and surveillance systems.
“If you do not collect the information or maintain these surveillance systems. You do not know what is happening. You do not know what the trends are,” said Dr. Philip Huang, Director of Dallas County Health and Human Services in Texas.
“You lose all this story,” he said.
In a previous position as Director of Chronic Diseases for Texas, Dr. Huang said he worked closely with CDC experts, who successfully reduced the use of tobacco between Americans.
“Eliminating the Office for Smoking and Health is just a crash if you still want to deal with chronic diseases,” he said.
Smoking is still the leading cause of death that can be prevented in the United States, causing more than 480,000 deaths each year, according to CDC
More than one in 10 American adults still smoke cigarettes regularly, but rates vary actively by region and monitoring of CDC helps interruption programs in areas where they are most needed.
“Smoking rates have declined, but if the federal government is getting its foot out of gas, tobacco companies are ready to emerge again,” said Erika Sward, assistant vice -president of defending the American Lung Association.
He warned that tobacco companies are constantly developing new products such as nicotine cases, whose use by adolescents was doubled last year. “It will take a lot more money to put the genie back to the bottle,” he said.
The CDC Disease Center works with communities and academic centers to promote effective programs, from creating hotels’ holidays to reach young Ibigans in rural areas for the preparation of black church members in Columbia, to lead their exercise and nutrition lessons.
In rural Missouri, dozens of hiking trails have been developed on the “start heel” in the southeast of the state, an area with high rates of obesity and diabetes, said Ross Brownson, a public health researcher at the University of Washington at St. Louis,
“There is strong evidence now that if you change the ability of a community, people will take more physical activity,” Dr. Brownson said. “There will be no health clubs in the rural communities, but there is nature and the ability to have hiking trails and the Earth is relatively cheap.”
With the support of the CDC, in Rochester, New York, people who are deaf and tough who have been heard are trained to drive exercise and well -being programs for other people with hearing problems who cannot easily participate in other fitness lessons.
In San Diego, researchers are testing ways to protect agricultural workers from exposure to ultraviolet rays and heat -related diseases.
“As soon as they start and started, they are guided by the community and are not dependent on the government,” said Allison Bay, who recently lost its job to manage such projects on CDC
The reorganization of CDC also eliminated lead poisoning programs. Lead poisoning is also “one of the biggest threats to public health in the city of Cleveland,” said Dr. David Margolius, director of public health for the city.
The CDC does not direct Cleveland lead programs directly – the funding comes from the state. “But just the federal know -how to call us to lead us to a future without lead. I mean, yes, this has a big impact on us,” he said.
