USAID Archives - TPR: The Public's Radio

Ophthalmic nurse Sister Tadelech Yilma (R) performs a tarsotomy surgery on trachoma patient and farmer Scheicho Scheifa (C) to address the damage caused by an advanced stage of trachoma at a medical facility in a village near Butajira, on January 17, 2025. Trachoma is responsible for blinding or visually impairing nearly two million people worldwide. It is caused by infection with the bacterium Chlamydia trachomatis, which is spread through contact with the eyes or nose of infected people. According to the World Health Organization, trachoma is "hyperendemic in many of the poorest and most rural areas" of the world, and Africa is the most affected continent. Around 103 million people worldwide live in areas where the infectious disease is endemic, according to the UN agency. Nearly half of those people are in Ethiopia, research has estimated. (

NPR

The fight to beat neglected tropical diseases was going well. 2025 could change that

by Jonathan Lambert December 10, 2025December 10, 2025

The campaign to prevent and treat these diseases has seen great success thanks to a USAID program. Now that program is gone.

The logistics warehouse in Geel, Belgium where contraceptives purchased by USAID were stored as of July.

NPR

A stock of U.S.-bought birth control, meant for sub-Saharan Africa, goes bad in Belgium

by Rachel Treisman November 15, 2025November 15, 2025

Millions of dollars worth of contraceptives have been stored in Belgium since the U.S. froze foreign aid. A local official says some products were stored improperly and are largely unusable.

From left: Santa Angwech, 26, is a single mother of 3 children and takes care of two more who are not her biological kids. She stopped receiving food aid from WFP in May 2025 when funding was cut. Michael Obwoya, 49, is an elder in Palabek Refugee Settlement in Northern Uganda. Florence Amungo, 34, a refugee from South Sudan, was enrolled in AVSI's program for more than 2 months before finding out the program was cut due to USAID cuts. She had started some small businesses, like a piggery, that she hoped the program would help her grow so that she can support her household of 14 people (her husband, their 5 biological children, and other children that she cares for).

NPR

They were promised a lifeline to ‘graduate’ from poverty. Then it was taken away

by Fatma Tanis November 2, 2025November 2, 2025

Thousands of South Sudanese refugees and impoverished locals in Uganda saw a brighter future with a new USAID-funded project. They’d get $205 and coaching to build a business. Then came the cuts.

Sandals outside a brothel on the Uganda-Kenya highway.

NPR

Aid cuts hit Uganda hard. With worry and grit, it’s finding new ways to save lives

by Brian Simpson September 19, 2025September 19, 2025

Uganda is one of the countries that’s greatly affected by the reduction of U.S. foreign aid. Here’s how the health care system is responding — with trepidation, innovation and resilience.

A view of a warehouse of Kuehne+Nagel, which houses U.S.-funded contraceptives worth nearly $10 million, after the U.S. State Department confirmed that the stocks would be sent to France to be destroyed, in Geel, Belgium July 24, 2025. REUTERS/Marta Fiorin/File Photo

NPR

The U.S. said it would burn $9.7 million of birth control. Its fate is still unclear

by Rachel Treisman September 16, 2025September 16, 2025

Questions about their fate swirled after the government’s July deadline for destruction came and went. Then came a false report they’d been incinerated. Aid groups say it’s not too late to save them.

A federal appeals court rules the Trump administration can withhold $4 billion approved by Congress for global health programs and more than $6 billion for HIV and AIDS prevention.

NPR

President Trump can continue to withhold billions in foreign aid, court rules

by Fatma Tanis August 13, 2025August 13, 2025

A federal appeals court handed President Trump a victory on Wednesday. The court ruled the administration can continue to freeze or terminate billions of dollars that Congress approved in foreign aid.

A production line at Edesia Nutrition's Rhode Island factory in February 2025. The room is filled with gravity-roller conveyance lines, metal machinery and large screens. A worker wearing a white coverall, a hairnet and gloves stands near one of the production lines.

NPR

Why the company that makes Plumpy’Nut is ‘just over the moon!’

by Gabrielle Emanuel August 13, 2025August 13, 2025

The therapeutic food is designed to bring malnourished kids back from the brink. A new order from the U.S. after months of mixed signals is good news for the Rhode Island factory that makes it.

KISUMU, KENYA - APRIL 24: Pharmacist Joseph Njer Airo inspects boxes of antiretroviral drugs labeled "USAID," from the last donation before the funding cuts inside the medical stockroom of Migosi Sub-county Hospital on April 24, 2025 in Kisumu, Kenya.Kisumu has one of the highest HIV rates in Kenya, with around 17.6% of the adult population are living with the virus, nearly five times the national average of 4.5%. In 2025, Kisumu has become a focal point of a growing healthcare crisis, as funding cuts from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) ripple through the local health system. USAID sent KES 84.1 billion (around USD 600 million) to Kenya to support a range of sectors, including health, education, and economic development. KES 18.8 billion was allocated to HIV/AIDS programs, which served as a critical lifeline for high-burden regions like Kisumu. What appeared at first to be a bureaucratic adjustment as Donald Trump became president has translated to severe disruption of life-saving services. Clinics are shutting down, access to essential medicines is diminishing, and some mothers have been forced to ration antiretroviral treatments (ARVS), risking both their health and that of their children. Thousands of lives now hang in the balance, and without urgent, sustained intervention, the progress made in HIV prevention and treatment over the past two decades risks being rapidly undone.

NPR

Study: 14 million lives could be lost due to Trump aid cuts

by Jonathan Lambert July 1, 2025July 1, 2025

A new study looks at lives saved by USAID in the past and what the future without the agency will look like.

TOPSHOT - Tributes are placed beneath the covered seal of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) at their headquarters in Washington, DC, on February 7, 2025. US President Donald Trump on February 7, 2025 called for USAID to be shuttered, escalating his unprecedented campaign to dismantle the humanitarian agency.

NPR

Farewell to USAID: Reflections on the agency that President Trump dismantled

by Ari Daniel July 1, 2025July 1, 2025

July 1 is the official end date for the agency that President Trump dismantled. We talk to four former top officials about this milestone event.

Ugandans in Kabale queue up for treatment for river blindness, a "neglected tropical disease" caused by a parasitic roundworm and transmitted by the bite of the black fly. The drug ivermectin, donated by a pharmaceutical company, kills the roundworm larvae. But now there's a freeze on the U.S. aid program that distributes the drug.

NPR

‘Neglected tropical diseases’ now face even more neglect

by Patrick Adams June 5, 2025June 5, 2025

U.S. aid cuts could jeopardize the supply of donated drugs that are hailed for their effectiveness in combating neglected diseases like river blindness, schistosomiasis and trachoma.