Cuts to CDC’s HIV Program Will Spell Disaster, HIV Advocate Says

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Division of HIV Prevention may be in trouble, according to today’s announcement from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services stating the Trump administration will cut approximately 10,000 jobs under the HHS. The change comes as part of President Trump's Executive Order, “Implementing the President’s ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ Workforce Optimization Initiative.”

Terri L. Wilder, MSW, an HIV/aging policy advocate at the elder LGBTQ+ organization SAGE, spoke with Managed Healthcare Executive and shared why the CDC’s Division of HIV Prevention is an important resource.

“The CDC is really important to public health in the United States and quite frankly, the world, because the world looks to the CDC for guidance,” Wilder said. “The CDC creates the HIV screening guidelines available to healthcare providers to guide them in how to offer HIV testing to the patients that come into their practice. [The CDC] exports these policies. It's not just people in the United States that are healthcare providers that go to the CDC website. It's healthcare and public health providers around the world, because the CDC is a trusted source of information.”

Approximately 1.2 million people are living with HIV in the United States, and an estimated 13% don’t know they have it, according to the CDC. Cases have fallen 12% from 2018 to 2022, in which 31,800 new cases were reported.

Funding and restructuring rumors began to swirl last week, thanks to an article published by the Wall Street Journal. The article reported that the HHS had been debating whether to drastically cut funding.