Austin Public Health will lose almost $15 million over time in federal grants that were used to address COVID-19 and other community needs, the department announced during an April 2 Austin City Council Public Health Committee meeting. The loss in funding comes after cuts were made at the federal level.
Adrienne Sturrup, director of Austin Public Health, said the Texas Department of State Health Services informed her about the funding loss in late March. Two COVID-19 grants for immunizations and disease surveillance were affected by the cuts. She said other community programs were also impacted, such as a tobacco cessation program for LGBTQ+ members, along with a refugee services clinic that offered examinations and public health screenings. Over 20 positions were affected, and the department is expected to lose about $7.5 million on an annualized basis, Sturrup said.
“There’s a sense of sadness, not only for the staff (who) are directly impacted, but for the residents and community who will no longer have access to these services,” Sturrup said. “The next time that there’s a pandemic, if there is support from the federal level, we’re back to ground zero of recruiting, hiring and training people to do services.”
Vianca Rodríguez-Feliciano, press secretary for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, said in an email the institution decided to cut the COVID-19 grants because they are no longer needed. The funding was largely used for testing, vaccination and to address health disparities in underserved communities, Rodríguez-Feliciano said.
“The COVID-19 pandemic is now over, and HHS will no longer waste billions of taxpayer dollars responding to a non-existent pandemic that Americans moved on from years ago,” Rodríguez-Feliciano wrote. “HHS is prioritizing funding projects that will deliver on President Trump’s mandate to address our chronic disease epidemic and Make America Healthy Again.”
Although the COVID-19 grants were used to respond to the pandemic, Sturrup said the funding was also utilized to treat monkeypox and track measles cases.
“We were really hopeful and excited at the opportunity to sustain that capacity beyond COVID,” Sturrup said. “Those dollars were needed. Those people were needed.”
Rodriguez-Feliciano said in an email the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which originally issued the COVID-19 grants and is housed within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, will save approximately $11.4 billion 30 days after grant termination notices were issued nationwide.
Sturrup said Austin Public Health is working to find positions for its employees affected by the grant cuts. If the department cannot offer the workers another position, she said it will look for employment opportunities in other city offices.
Despite the loss in funding, Sturrup said the department will continue to serve the community to the best of its ability.
“We did it during COVID-19,” Sturrup said. “We didn’t know what was going to happen one day to the next, but we stayed steadfast, the community walked alongside us and we made it through. I am confident that if we apply that same mindset, we can get over this hurdle.”
