Massive cuts put more than 200 jobs at WA State Department of Health and other health partners at risk
Trump admin revoking funding will severely curtail WA & other states’ ability to respond to the measles outbreak, avian flu, and other infectious diseases in real time and threaten local work to combat mental health and opioid crises
Washington, D.C. — Today, U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee and a senior member and former chair of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP), issued the following statement on the Trump administration’s sudden decision to cancel billions of dollars in already-awarded funding for states, Tribes, and localities to address public health threats, tackle the mental health crisis, connect people to substance abuse treatment, and more. Revoking this funding puts at least 200 jobs in Washington state immediately at risk.
“Senselessly ripping away this funding Congress provided will undermine our state’s ability to protect families from infectious diseases like measles and bird flu and to help people get the mental health care and substance use treatment they need—causing immediate harm for millions of real people and communities across America.
“The loss of more than $160 million in funding that has already been awarded to Washington state’s health department, Tribes, and other organizations could mean cuts to essential health services and layoffs of staff on the frontlines working to keep communities healthy, address public health threats and outbreaks, tackle the opioid epidemic and mental health crisis, and so much else.
“This is another destructive move by an administration intent on breaking government with no discernible strategy or plan—making our communities less safe in the process—and it should be immediately reversed.”
This week, the Trump administration cancelled over $11 billion in funding awarded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and roughly $1 billion in Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) funding. The CDC cuts will severely harm Washington state and other states’ ability to respond to the measles outbreak, avian flu, and other infectious diseases in real time due to rescissions of funding for the Epidemiology and Laboratory Capacity (ELC) Program in particular.
The Washington State Department of Health (DOH) received notices from the Trump administration immediately terminating—effective March 24th —more than $130 million in funding that supports critical public health systems including disease monitoring, reporting, and vaccine efforts for COVID-19 and other respiratory viruses. The funding also supports critical DOH IT systems for public health (e.g. disease surveillance, lab reporting), and key capabilities that prevent and address outbreaks of respiratory illnesses and vaccine preventable disease. In addition, the Trump administration is terminating approximately $34 million in SAMHSA funding for the Washington State Health Care Authority (HCA) which funds local efforts to combat the mental health and opioid crises. These funds mainly support grants directly to hundreds of small community organizations throughout the state.
The immediate cuts hurt work carried out by more than 200 full-time equivalent (FTE) staff at the Washington state Department of Health and additional partners, which include local health jurisdictions, Tribal health clinics and organizations, and community-based organizations. Now, the jobs of these employees—who were, up until the recissions notices were received this week, hard at work on critical public health projects funded by these grants—are at risk.
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