Yesterday, President Trump halted all foreign aid, including PEPFAR, the US program that has saved >21 million lives by providing HIV medications. My colleague Dr. Atul Gawande posted about this and other key affected programs on Threads today. Atul just finished a three-year stint running US global health initiatives for USAID, so he has a real handle on this.
What I wanted to know—and what so many of you are asking—is: How immediate is the impact of Trump’s executive action? Is it only relevant once dispensed funding runs out, or do people stop showing up for work in clinics in South Africa tomorrow?
I was about to call Atul to find out. Then we decided, "Why not have our conversation live on Instagram?" Our goal was to have the chat be as close to the real conversation we’d actually have if nobody were listening. While it’s not entirely possible for us to shed our interview personas, we gave it a try.
The result is a meaty (Atul’s word) 24-minute discussion covering the programs affected, the real immediate impact (spoiler alert: not good), and the general state of affairs in the federal government right now.
Keep in mind that talking to Atul is as close to an insider perspective as we can possibly get right now. As of 11:59 a.m. last Monday, he was no longer a federal employee. That means he’s not subject to the chilling gag order temporarily banning all communications from US public health agencies and employees. So this is an excellent opportunity for access and insight, and I’m grateful we were able to do this.
Have a listen to our conversation and then join the conversation in the Comments. (For the transcript, there’s a tab directly below the video itself. Also, sorry for the vertical format. That’s Instagram Live’s platform.)
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