In case you run into a MAGA bitching about egg prices, tell them Biden allocated $306 million for bird flu response. [View all]

[LaMouffette]

And now Rump is clawing back every dollar to fund his massive tax cut for billionaires and firing the researchers tasked with responding to pandemics. The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has an Office of Pandemics and Emerging Threats (PET). I predict that its director, Summer Galloway, will soon be forced to resign and PET will be terminated. Rump et al. want us to die.

Biden administration allocates $306m in its final days for bird flu response

The Biden administration, in its waning days, is allocating $306m to respond to public health threats from bird flu, a move applauded by public health experts as the H5N1 outbreak continues to expand among people and animals in the US.

As the outbreak intensifies, the US should continue investing in pandemic response like wastewater monitoring, vaccine manufacturing and distribution, rapid test development and other pressing needs to curtail the outbreak, experts say.

But it’s not clear whether the incoming Trump administration will continue such work.

About $183m of the new funding will go toward pandemic preparedness writ large, especially treatment, at the regional, state and local level, while $103m will be spent monitoring people who have been exposed to the bird flu virus. Another $8m will go to test manufacturing and distribution, and $11m is set aside for research on how to combat H5N1.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/15/biden-administration-bird-flu-funding

Trump 'planning mass job cuts at US health agencies'

(February 7, 2025, from PharmaPhorum) The Trump administration is preparing a new executive order that would seek thousands of layoffs at federal health agencies, including the FDA, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Citing people familiar with the matter, the news service reports that an order could be issued as early as next week mandating that agencies shed a certain percentage of their workforce.

The White House has, however, denied that an executive order relating to agencies that come under the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is forthcoming, says the WSJ.

Officials at federal agencies have already been asked to prepare lists of employees who are essential for operations – as well as those who are not. That is focusing on probationary employees – i.e., those who recently took up employment – for whom it would be easier to terminate their jobs.

https://pharmaphorum.com/news/trump-planning-mass-job-cuts-us-health-agencies