In South Africa, which runs the biggest HIV program in the world providing treatment to 5.5 million people with U.S. assistance, an alliance of health groups said the cuts were a crisis and people would die.
The Trump administration’s decision to terminate 90% of USAID’s’ foreign aid contracts slammed humanitarian projects worldwide on Thursday, from a new hospital in troubled Haiti to the biggest HIV program on the planet in South Africa.
The International Rescue Committee, which works in some of the worst humanitarian crises, said the “widespread termination” of USAID funding could cut off help for millions of people and urged the U.S. administration to reconsider.
“We are being pushed off a cliff,” said Dr. Kate Rees, a public health specialist who works at one of the biggest NGOs fighting HIV in South Africa, the country worst affected by the disease.
The U.S. is by far the world’s biggest donor and NGOs in almost every corner of the world had feared over the last month for their programs and the impact cuts would have on millions of vulnerable people they help.
