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The Trump administration has decided to start phasing out HIV funding for South Africa following the country’s “failure to make demonstrable progress on policy requests by the administration,” a State Department official told POLITICO on Thursday. The official, who agreed to discuss the decision only if POLITICO did not use their name, said the decision to “initiate a phased drawdown of PEPFAR programming in South Africa” is in line with President Donald Trump’s February 2025 executive order accusing South Africa of discriminating against its white Afrikaner minority and directing U.S. agencies to stop providing aid to the country unless it changes its policies. (Paun, 6/18)

After the Trump administration upended the world’s largest foreign aid provider last year, terminating thousands of programs and firing nearly all of its staff, its plan for the agency was clear: Eliminate it entirely. But because it is a congressionally created agency, President Donald Trump needed lawmakers’ permission to do so. So this year, Trump officials asked Congress for permission to shutter the U.S. Agency for International Development and dramatically reduce federal spending on food, medicine and lifesaving work around the world. (Barry-Jester, 6/22)

Lawmakers acted earlier this year to save a key AIDS drug program from drastic cuts, but a new report from the state released Monday indicates the program remains in peril. A report by the Florida Department of Health argues the state won’t be able to secure enough funds for the AIDS Drug Assistance Program if it continues to serve people at 400 percent of the poverty level. (Goni-Lessan, 6/19)

Starting in July, some Medicare beneficiaries will be able to access GLP-1 medications by paying one flat fee per month. The temporary program is set to run for a year-and-a-half through the end of 2027. But with less than two weeks before its launch, questions remain over how it will operate. The Medicare GLP-1 Bridge, described by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) as a “time-limited demonstration,” will officially run from July 1, 2026, to Dec. 31, 2027. (Choi, 6/21)

Federal efforts to expand the number of primary care doctors in America have fallen short, a new study says. Primary care’s share of 1,000 new U.S. residency positions funded by Medicare has dwindled over time, researchers reported June 15 in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Overall, primary care positions increased by just 2% as a result of new laws passed in 2021 and 2023 to increase medical residencies in the United States. (Thompson, 6/22)

Deep inside a White House proposal to overhaul how the government awards grants is a short section that health disparities researchers say could disqualify much of their work from federal funding — perhaps the most serious threat yet to the future of their field. (Oza, 6/22)

Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he expects the US to stand by its trade commitments with Europe after Donald Trump’s administration launched a tariff investigation into Germany’s drug pricing. The German leader, who said decisions on pharmaceutical payments are a domestic matter, made the remarks after the US started an investigation under rules that allow the Office of the US Trade Representative to impose levies in response to unfair trade barriers. (Delfs and Kresge, 6/19)

Outgoing Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard has released what she described as previously unseen communications and documents related to the origins of COVID-19, research funding, and the alleged actions of Dr. Anthony Fauci. The documents, released late Thursday as part of what the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) described as a yearlong declassification review, include internal communications, whistleblower allegations and intelligence-related material tied to debates over how the coronavirus pandemic began. (Commander and Stevenson, 6/19)

A jar of sauerkraut has become an unlikely status symbol inside the Trump administration. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Vice President Vance have adopted a diet centered on fermented foods and grass-fed meat, according to a Wall Street Journal report. The diet is recommended by Dr. Sean O’Mara, who encourages patients to eat more sauerkraut, kimchi and grass-fed steak while cutting out alcohol and sugar. He says the approach reduces visceral fat and supports gut health. (Fischels, 6/20)

�������ýҕ�l Health News: �������ýҕ�l Health News’ ‘What The Health?’: Democrats Keep Healthcare At The Fore

Senate Democrats hope a little-used law from the 1990s will help draw attention to the healthcare cost issue by forcing a vote on the Trump administration’s recent changes to the Affordable Care Act. Meanwhile, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is demanding information from a medical journal that retracted a study that backed Kennedy’s claims of vaccine harm. (Rovner, 6/18)

Even as it battled the deadliest drug epidemic in American history, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration permitted hundreds of thousands of fentanyl pills to hit the streets of New Mexico between 2023 and 2025, according to three current and former DEA agents and government records reviewed by The Associated Press. DEA agents repeatedly monitored shipments of fentanyl pills — but did not seize them — as federal prosecutors sought to bring bigger criminal cases against traffickers of a synthetic opioid that the White House last year designated a “ weapon of mass destruction.” (Mustian and Goodman, 6/22)

A foul odor permeated the early morning heat as city workers in Tempe, Ariz., unlocked a sewage monitoring shed and opened the tap of a collection jug that had been siphoning from the city’s wastewater over the previous day. They filled a jar, packed it in a blue cooler and hurried to the next shed, or “doghouse,” retrieving from 11 in all. Rushing to prevent the samples from degrading under the glowering sun, they delivered the coolers to a new municipal lab, where chemists test sewage for traces of dangerous drugs. (Hoffman, 6/21)