Yes, the Cuts to USAID Have Killed

[Nevilledog]

https://www.thebulwark.com/p/yes-the-cuts-to-usaid-have-killed

IN A RECENT VIDEO, Elon Musk, the world’s first trillionaire, defended his decision last year to feed the United States Agency for International Development “into the wood chipper.” When someone on his social-media platform claimed that not a single child had died because of his destroying USAID, he reposted their argument with a single word of commentary: “Exactly.” Musk said that during his “DOGE” rampage he’d never been able to talk to any real children who could prove to him they were suffering and receiving help from the agency, because it was so full of “fraud and graft.”

But Musk is wrong. Many people, including many children, have died as a direct result of the cuts he and his DOGE team made to USAID. And the number of deaths no longer being prevented by the agency will only grow.

To back up, USAID was established in 1961 to end extreme global poverty, promote democracy, and advance U.S. interests. In the five years prior to the second Trump administration, U.S. spending on foreign aid—a figure that includes but is not limited to the work of USAID—ranged from $35.6 billion to $61.2 billion per year, or less than 1 percent of the federal budget. It also typically accounted for over a quarter of total development assistance given by all countries put together. In some twenty developing countries, U.S. aid “equaled more than 10 percent of domestic health expenditure,” according to an analysis from the Center for Global Development; in one case, Afghanistan, American aid equaled three times the domestic health expenditure. In 2024, 50 to 60 percent of Côte D’Ivoire’s AIDS response was funded by the United States. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, that figure was 89 percent.

And if we define success as saving lives, USAID was working. Not by itself, but alongside parallel investments by Global South governments, advocacy by people, and economic growth. One study estimates that USAID saved around 92 million lives over the last two decades, including 30.4 million children under 5. Since 1990, the world has more than halved the number of children dying before the age of 5, from 13 million a year to 4.9 million. Between 2000 and 2023, we cut maternal deaths by 40 percent. USAID is an important part of that story.

These positive indicators are changing direction for the first time in thirty years. Around 200,000 more children are believed to have died in 2025 than in 2024. Over 1,300 health and family planning clinics have closed globally due to USAID cuts. Thousands of medical professionals were laid off. Studies show an increase in child marriages, violence against women and girls, and civil disorder, including riots and armed battles. Lancet modeling indicates USAID cuts may cause 14 million deaths, including those of 4.5 million children under age 5, by 2030.

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