--- description: Multiple studies have estimated millions will die annually as a result of the Trump Administration’s closure of the foreign-aid agency. title: The Forecasted Death Toll of Shuttering USAID image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1c1c52fa919f7c69/6998c7e9f1b0822dd56f17b1/usaid-closed.jpg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [World](/section/world/) ## World Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [global health](/tag/global-health/) ## global health Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Shuttering of USAID Will Lead to Millions of Deaths Around the World: Studies  by [Chad de Guzman](/author/chad-de-guzman/)  ## Chad de Guzman Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Reporter Jul 1, 2025 9:45 AM CUT  Flags at the U.S. Agency for International Development headquarters in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 3, 2025. Flags at the U.S. Agency for International Development headquarters in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 3, 2025.Jason C. Andrew—Bloomberg/Getty Images  by [Chad de Guzman](/author/chad-de-guzman/)  ## Chad de Guzman Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Reporter Jul 1, 2025 9:45 AM CUT President John F. Kennedy [said](https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/special-message-the-congress-foreign-aid-1 "undefined") in 1961 that “there is no escaping” what he described as America’s “moral obligations as a wise leader and good neighbor in the interdependent community of free nations; our economic obligations as the wealthiest people in a world of largely poor people, as a nation no longer dependent upon the loans from abroad that once helped us develop our own economy; and our political obligations as the single largest counter to the adversaries of freedom.” He was speaking to Congress about foreign aid and later that year would establish through [executive order](https://archives.federalregister.gov/issue%5Fslice/1961/11/7/10467-10472.pdf "undefined") what has since been known as the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which helped make the U.S. the world’s largest foreign aid provider. For more than six decades, USAID has helped dozens of low- and middle-income countries, including conflict-stricken ones, to improve access to food, water, health care, and education. It’s helped stop disease outbreaks, revolutionize agricultural practices, and in some cases, promote democracy. But on Tuesday, USAID shutters its doors for good. The agency’s [dismantling](https://time.com/7211200/usaid-foreign-aid-freeze-trump-rubio/ "undefined") began just days after President Donald Trump returned to the White House at the start of this year. Tech billionaire and [one-time Trump ally Elon Musk](https://time.com/7298982/musk-trump-big-beautiful-bill-debt-primary-republicans-america-party/ "undefined"), who was spearheading the Department of Government Efficiency, singled out the agency as a locus of “[corruption and waste](https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1885777925158437177 "undefined"),”despite the fact that it constituted just about 0.5% of government spending. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who took the reins of the agency in February, [said](https://x.com/marcorubio/status/1899021361797816325 "undefined") in March that more than four-fifths of USAID programs were cancelled, and the approximately 1,000 that remained would be absorbed by the State Department by [July 1](https://www.state.gov/on-delivering-an-america-first-foreign-assistance-program/ "undefined"), even amid [court battles](https://www.npr.org/2025/03/18/nx-s1-5332274/judge-ruling-usaid-shutdown "undefined") about the constitutionality of USAID’s closure. On the eve of USAID’s final day, former Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama gathered with former staffers as well as U2 singer and humanitarian Bono on a video call. Obama described USAID’s gutting as a “travesty” and a “tragedy,” according to the [Associated Press](https://apnews.com/article/obama-bono-bush-usaid-trump-950f7708c01502c759f1c10524752b8e "undefined"). “You’ve showed the great strength of America through your work,” Bush told the USAID staffers. “Is it in our national interests that 25 million people who would have died now live? I think it is, and so do you.” Trump, evidently, does not. Just how many lives won’t be saved as a result of the closure of USAID has been the subject of several studies and [projections](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/02/health/usaid-cuts-deaths-infections.html "undefined"). On Monday, medical research journal [_The Lancet_](https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2825%2901186-9/fulltext "undefined")estimated that USAID prevented the deaths of more than 90 million people between 2001 to 2021\. The study, conducted by researchers from Brazil, Mozambique, and Spain, forecasted that the defunding of the agency could lead to some 14 million deaths by 2030, including 4.5 million deaths of children and babies under the age of 5. Here are some of the biggest estimated impacts of the U.S. shirking Kennedy’s “obligations.” ## Hundreds of thousands of HIV-AIDS deaths To fight against HIV globally, President Bush launched PEPFAR, or the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, in 2003\. The program supports some 20.6 million people with HIV worldwide, including 566,000 children, through providing anti-retroviral therapy (ART) to control the infection. The program also provided HIV testing services to 83.8 million people in 2024. USAID was PEPFAR’s [main implementing agency](https://www.state.gov/about-us-pepfar "undefined"), and while the State Department is seeking [$2.9 billion](https://www.state.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/FY-2026-State-CBJ-.pdf "undefined") in funding to continue HIV-AIDS programs, it’s far lower than the [at least $4.7 billion](https://2021-2025.state.gov/pepfar-world-aids-day-2023/update-on-pepfars-programming-budget-for-2024-2025/ "undefined") budget PEPFAR had. A [study](https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11959925/ "undefined") published in the _Retrovirology_ journal in March said that the suspension of USAID funding could hamper access to ART and cause a potential resurgence of up to [630,000](https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11959925/ "undefined") HIV-AIDS-related deaths annually, with [sub-Saharan Africa](https://data.unaids.org/pub/globalreport/2008/20080715%5Ffs%5Fssa%5Fen.pdf "undefined") most affected. ## Millions of malaria cases USAID has invested [$9 billion](https://oig.usaid.gov/node/7478 "undefined") to help tackle malaria, the mosquito-borne illness that is preventable and curable but causes millions of deaths in Africa every year, since the inception of the President’s Malaria Initiative (PMI) in 2005. An [impact tracker](https://www.impactcounter.com/dashboard?view=table&sort=interval%5Fminutes&order=asc "undefined") by Boston University infectious disease mathematical modeller and health economist Dr. Brooke Nichols and Amsterdam-based product managerEric Moakley forecast almost 10 million additional cases of malaria globally—of which an estimated 7 million would affect children—in just one year due to USAID funding cuts. The tracker also only considered African countries that were part of PMI and did not include countries in Asia that have also been supported by USAID. “Thus we may be underestimating the effect of PMI’s cessation,” it said. ## Millions of Sudanese to lose access to ‘lifesaving’ health services The war-torn northeast African country of Sudan was among those worst hit by USAID’s suspension. [More than half](https://www.rescue.org/article/crisis-sudan-what-happening-and-how-help "undefined") of its 50 million population is in need of humanitarian assistance as residents suffer from famine and disease outbreaks amid ongoing conflict. The World Health Organization estimates that 5 million Sudanese people may lose access to “lifesaving” health services as a result of the cuts, according to the [_Washington Post_](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/06/29/sudan-usaid-funding-cuts-trump-musk/ "undefined"). Naomi Ruth Pendle, a lecturer at the University of Bath in the U.K., wrote for [The Conversation](https://theconversation.com/usaid-the-human-cost-of-donald-trumps-aid-freeze-for-a-war-torn-part-of-sudan-254215 "undefined")in April that the sudden suspension of USAID is “is set to make the famine in Sudan the deadliest for half a century.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/7298994/usaid-deaths-studies-estimates-foreign-aid-hiv-aids-malaria-sudan/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/7298994/usaid-deaths-studies-estimates-foreign-aid-hiv-aids-malaria-sudan/"},"headline":"Shuttering of USAID Will Lead to Millions of Deaths Around the World: Studies","datePublished":"2025-07-01T09:45:00.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-11T01:23:59.240Z","description":"Multiple studies have estimated millions will die annually as a result of the Trump Administration’s closure of the foreign-aid agency.","url":"https://time.com/7298994/usaid-deaths-studies-estimates-foreign-aid-hiv-aids-malaria-sudan/","keywords":["global health","Donald Trump","overnight","News Desk"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1c1c52fa919f7c69/6998c7e9f1b0822dd56f17b1/usaid-closed.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Chad de Guzman","jobTitle":"Reporter","url":"https://time.com/author/chad-de-guzman/"}],"articleSection":"World","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1c1c52fa919f7c69/6998c7e9f1b0822dd56f17b1/usaid-closed.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Trump And Musk's USAID 'Shut Down' Threat Opens Door For China","caption":"Trump And Musk's USAID 'Shut Down' Threat Opens Door For China","creditText":"Jason C. 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