1. United States
2. Va.
3. Letter

The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is currently facing drastic cuts to budgets and staffing. These cuts would affect agencies within HHS such as the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), National Institutes of Health (NIH), and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). These cuts would devastate public health and affect the lives of millions of Americans. Cuts to CMS would ravage essential health care services for approximately 40 percent of the US population. Cuts to the CDC would disrupt infectious disease surveillance, which increases the risk of an outbreak. Cuts to the FDA would undermine safety protections for patients for medicines and medical devices. The Trump Administration’s proposed cuts to HHS would undo a century of progress in public health.