The Impending HIV Resurgence
By Katie Suleta, DHSc, MPH — Apr 24, 2025
The Trump Administration has gutted many areas of healthcare funding and research, especially in infectious diseases. One area that has been particularly hard hit has been research, prevention, and treatment for Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV). While the COVID-19 pandemic is still fresh in everyone's mind, the HIV pandemic seems to have slipped from the general public's awareness. It's time for a refresher on just how bad the 1980s were.
The 1980s
In the early 1980s, a diagnosis of HIV was a death sentence. It killed, seemingly quickly and mercilessly, sparking panic and fear. It inspired a new type of civil activism. It also changed how we think about infectious diseases, at least temporarily.
The first death in the United States occurred in 1981. By 1990, about 100,000 people had died of acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS).
“By 1988, HIV infection/AIDS had become the third leading cause of death among men 25-44 years of age and, by 1989, was estimated to be second, surpassing heart disease, cancer, suicide, and homicide.” [emphasis added]
– MMWR, January 25, 1991.
Today, by at least one estimate, the third leading cause of death among men 25-44 years of age is heart disease. Heart disease--you know, one of the conditions that ostensibly has the Make America Healthy Again crew all worked up.
Progress in HIV
According to the United Nations, in 2023, globally, around 630,000 people died from AIDS, which is a drastic reduction from the peak of 2.1 million in 2004. The HIV pandemic inspired a lot of biomedical and social sciences research. It also inspired new regulations and diplomacy. For example:
- Antiretroviral therapy: These drugs help suppress the virus. These drugs extend life and make it unlikely for those people with HIV to infect others while they are in treatment.
- Rapid HIV tests: Previously, testing involved a blood draw that took days to produce results. Now, we have tests that provide results within about 20 minutes.
- The Ryan White Act: This act made obtaining HIV treatment possible for low-income and uninsured/underinsured people in the United States.
These advancements came after hundreds of thousands and some after millions of deaths globally. We poured money into understanding the virus, how it's contracted, how it operates in the body, how to effectively treat it. HIV’s impact on public health, biomedical research, and the global population cannot be overstated. We've fought hard for our success in reducing the number of deaths and new infections.
HIV and The Trump Administration
Anyone in the public health and healthcare sectors can tell you that times are rough in the United States. Money and staff have been cut. Resources and data have been deleted. Careers, both fledgling and established, have ended abruptly, with decades of work unraveling through eliminating agencies and departments and funding cuts.
HIV has been particularly hard hit. Reflecting on the aforementioned list of accomplishments, it becomes clear that the Trump Administration specifically targets work in HIV.
PrEP: The Trump Administration deleted several pages and resources on Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) from the Centers for Disease Control Website. These pages provided information to patients and providers and information on how to obtain PrEP. They have been, at least temporarily, reinstated, but with a warning:
Pending a court order, it's safe to assume that the pages marked with this box will either be deleted (since they already were once before) or substantially changed at the very least.
The Ryan White Act: The Health Resources and Services Administration used to house a data dashboard called the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program Compass Dashboard - a taxpayer-funded source of insight into HIV in the US. However, as of this writing, it now provides this message:
Data, once publicly available, now removed. So much for transparency.
USAID: The website now links directly to this message:
According to a March Reuters report, due to the elimination of USAID, eight countries may run out of highly active antiretroviral drugs in the coming months. These include Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa, and Ukraine.
“The disruptions to HIV programs could undo 20 years of progress,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a press conference. He added that this could lead to over 10 million additional HIV cases and three million HIV-related deaths.”
The Future of HIV in the United States
According to the United Nations,
“Funding for HIV dropped by 5% from 2022 to 2023 and by 7.9% between 2020 and 2023. …Funding is far short of the US$ 29.3 billion (in constant 2019 United States dollars) which will be required for the AIDS response in low- and middle-income countries, including countries formerly considered to be upper-income countries, in 2025 to get on track to end AIDS as a public health threat.”
This was happening before the Trump Administration started its burn-it-to-the-ground policies. There is even talk of eliminating the Division of HIV Prevention within the CDC. If COVID has taught us anything, viruses don't respect international borders. Given the actions of the Administration, we're setting ourselves and the world up for a resurgence of HIV infections and deaths from AIDS. This is entirely preventable.
The investments that the United States made in combating this disease have not only kept its citizens safer and healthier, it also spawned goodwill throughout the world. Preventing, treating, and tracking HIV has been a global goal since the beginning of the HIV pandemic - 40 years of progress that the Trump administration has decided to throw away.
People will die because of these choices. We've seen what this will lead to. If you don't believe me, just look back at the headlines from the 1980s. We've literally experienced this before and are choosing to repeat it. Defunding HIV treatment, testing, and prevention does not make anyone healthier. It makes the second leading cause of death in young men a preventable infectious disease. It reduces our life expectancy. It’s condemning us to relive the past. So much for focusing on prevention and the root cause of illness.
Contact
Erik Lief
Director of Communications
American Council on Science and Health
New York, N.Y.
liefe@acsh.org
Source: THE AMERICAN COUNCIL ON SCIENCE AND HEALTH (ACSH)
https://www.acsh.org/news/2025/04/24/impending-hiv-resurgence-49437
"Reproduced with permission - THE AMERICAN COUNCIL ON SCIENCE AND HEALTH (ACSH)"
THE AMERICAN COUNCIL ON SCIENCE AND HEALTH (ACSH)
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