Budget would slash HHS, NIH funding

The Hill

02-05-2025

That doesn't include coverage programs like Medicare and Medicaid.
The Trump administration said the cuts were justified because they eliminated programs and agencies considered duplicative, 'woke,' unnecessary or a failure by the previous administration.
The proposal calls for the elimination of funding for programs like the National Institute on Minority and Health Disparities, the National Institute of Nursing Research and the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health.
White House budget requests are often aspirational documents. They give a view of the administration's priorities but usually differ from what Congress inevitably adopts. However, Republicans in Congress have been deferential to Trump.
Overall, the budget seeks to cut $33.3 billion in funding for HHS — which amounts to 26.6 percent reduction compared to the enacted level for fiscal year 2025.
This reduction includes:
A $3.6 billion cut to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
An $18 billion reduction for the National Institutes of Health, the largest proposed cut in the budget
A $674 million reduction for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Program Management
A $240 million reduction for the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response Hospital Preparedness Program.
There is only one health program that gains any discretionary funding: $500 million for HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy's Make American Healthy Again Commission, which was created by an executive order earlier this year.
These funds would allow 'allow the Secretary to tackle nutrition, physical activity, healthy lifestyles, over-reliance on medication and treatments, the effects of new technological habits, environmental impacts, and food and drug quality and safety across HHS,' according to the document.
Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) said she has 'serious objections' to parts of the request, including cuts to biomedical research.