Women are being turned away at clinics that provided maternity and reproductive care, as well as cancer and H.I.V. treatment. Doctors and nurses have been placed on leave and told to go home. Aid agencies report that decades of female-focused health care work has been “decimated overnight.”
Three weeks into President Trump’s suspension of all foreign aid, the impact on millions of women and girls is described as catastrophic, with health care systems “crumbling,” according to the United Nations and other women-focused global aid agencies.
Elisha Dunn-Georgiou, president and chief executive of the Global Health Council, stated, “You can’t get treatment and you can’t get care because America has decided on a whim that you are not worthy, that is unfathomable. We are in the fight for everybody’s lives.”
As of Wednesday, approximately 2.5 million women and girls have been denied contraceptive care, a figure projected to rise to 11.7 million by the end of the Trump administration’s 90-day review process for foreign aid, according to Dr. Elizabeth Sully, principal research scientist at the Guttmacher Institute.
The Trump administration has frozen nearly all foreign aid pending a review aimed at identifying effective programs and those misaligned with U.S. national interests, as stated by Secretary of State Marco Rubio during a recent visit to the Dominican Republic. The United States Agency for International Development (U.S.A.I.D.), which distributed much of the aid for women’s groups, has been significantly reduced, with remaining operations now managed by the State Department.
At a panel organized by the United Nations Foundation, representatives from various organizations, including the United Nations Population Fund and the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, expressed alarm over the chaotic breakdown of health care operations and the loss of trust built over decades.
The State Department did not respond to requests for comment regarding the situation.
Historically, the United States has been a leading contributor to global health, providing about 40 percent of all donations for global family planning through U.S.A.I.D., according to Dr. Sully.
Mr. Rubio has indicated that the U.S. will issue emergency waivers for humanitarian work, asserting that lifesaving aid such as food and medicine is exempt from the freeze. However, global aid agencies contest this claim, stating that waivers are not available where programs operate, and staff who would process them are on leave.
Ms. Dunn-Georgiou remarked, “If you are hearing from the U.S. government there is a waiver, that is a lie,” emphasizing concerns that family planning and contraceptive programs could vanish permanently. The State Department did not comment on the waivers.
In his first week in office, Mr. Trump reinstated a Republican anti-abortion policy that prohibits federal funding to any overseas nongovernmental organization that performs or promotes abortions.
Caitlin Horrigan, senior director of Global Advocacy for Planned Parenthood Federation of America, stated, “Already the Trump administration has attacked services and systems that keep millions of people safe and healthy in our country and around the world.”
Dr. Carole Sekimpi, senior director of MSI Africa, reported widespread fear and anxiety as programs across Africa reliant on U.S. aid have been closed, with staff sent home. In Uganda, hundreds of physicians providing H.I.V. care have been dismissed, raising concerns about the collapse of organizations dependent on U.S. funding.
The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) indicated that its global programs are affected by the U.S. funding freeze, as the United States contributes 30 percent of the agency’s administrative costs and 50 percent of its humanitarian aid funding. Over the past four years, this amounted to $725 million, supporting mental health care for women in Ukraine, displaced women in Chad, and maternal care for Afghan women.
Rachel Moynihan, deputy director of UNFPA’s North America office, noted that the suspension of services and breakdown of trust jeopardizes U.S. investments in the agency and local governments' investments in their health care systems, which the U.N. has encouraged.