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The Trump administration has signed the first in what are expected to be dozens of “America First” global health funding agreements that will prioritize combating infectious diseases in countries deemed to be aligned with the president’s broader foreign policy goals and positions. (Lee and Imray, 12/5)

More news about federal funding —

A federal appeals court on Thursday rejected the Trump administration’s bid to halt an order requiring it to release millions of dollars in grants meant to address the shortage of mental health workers in schools. The mental health program, which was funded by Congress after the 2022 school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, included grants meant to help schools hire more counselors, psychologists and social workers, with a focus on rural and underserved areas of the country. (12/5)

Trump’s budget includes nearly $1 trillion in cuts to Medicaid, which funds a wide swath of services to disabled children, including speech, occupational and physical therapy, wheelchairs, in-home aides and medical care. All children with physical, developmental or cognitive disabilities – in California, nearly 1 million – receive at least some services through Medicaid. Meanwhile, at the U.S. Department of Education, Trump has gutted the Office of Civil Rights, which is among the agencies that enforce the 50-year-old law granting students with disabilities the right to attend school and receive an education appropriate to their needs. (Jones, 12/4)

The offices at John Quackenbush’s lab at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health were once full of postdoctoral fellows, graduate students, and interns. Young scientists here worked on some of the most cutting-edge computational biology research in the world, driving new discoveries and the creation of widely used big data tools, including one the National Cancer Institute named among the most important advances of 2024. Today, the offices are rows of empty computer pods. Monitor brackets at each station hang in the air as bare as bleached corals. (Chen, 12/5)

On artificial intelligence —

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services on Thursday outlined a strategy to expand its use of artificial intelligence, building on the Trump administration’s enthusiastic embrace of the rapidly advancing technology while raising questions about how health information would be protected. HHS billed the plan as a “first step” focused largely on making its work more efficient and coordinating AI adoption across divisions. But the 20-page document also teased some grander plans to promote AI innovation, including in the analysis of patient health data and in drug development. (Swenson, 12/4)

On the immigration crisis —

A 6-year-old boy from Queens was separated from his father and placed in federal custody in New York City as President Trump’s deportation crackdown has swept up increasing numbers of migrant families and children. The boy, Yuanxin Zheng, is among the youngest migrants to be taken from a parent by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials during a routine check-in in New York City. (Ley and Aleaziz, 12/4)

The federal deployments that have swept through major cities as part of President Trump’s immigration crackdown have led to thousands of arrests. But they have been less effective at apprehending immigrants with a criminal record than more routine operations elsewhere, new data shows. In high-profile Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations in Los Angeles; Chicago; Washington, D.C.; and across Massachusetts, more than half of those arrested had no criminal record, compared with a third of immigrants arrested nationwide. (Sun, 12/4)

On the gun violence epidemic —

More than a year before the Trump administration granted asylum to the Afghan immigrant, the volunteer’s emails raised concerns that he was unraveling. (Wong, Streeter, Padshah, Abed, Gibbons-Neff and Healy, 12/4)