Micheal Nelson Byaruhanga reports UK and US foreign aid cuts will consign millions of people to disease and early deaths
At Biiso Health IV in Uganda’s western district of Buliisa, a young mother living with HIV who prefers anonymity has brought her healthy baby for immunisation. Despite being HIV-positive, she benefited from the United States President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) for treatment to protect her health and prevent mother-to-child transmission.
However, on August 31st, 2025, a US Agency for International Development (USAID)-funded Baylor College of Medicine Children’s Foundation Uganda withdrew its HIV support services from this rural health centre owing to President Trump’s USAID shutdown earlier in the development. A statement by the White House released on February 3, 2025, accused USAID of wastefulness, money laundering, and sponsoring covert operations, resulting in anti-American sentiment.
A report by Joy for Children Uganda indicates that in Uganda alone, an estimated 41 newborns contract HIV every day during the stoppage. The report further shows that with USAID’s closure, most of these babies in rural areas will go undiagnosed due to the suspension of infant HIV testing services, facing a significantly higher risk of mortality.
Zion Alinaitwe, the head of Antiretroviral Therapy (ART) clinic at Biiso Health Centre IV, reveals that Baylor has been providing HIV testing services to over 5000 community members per year and assisting with effective management of over 800 patients active on ART. Dr. Alinaitwe Jonan, the health centre’s in-charge medic, fears that the eight Baylor-supported workers who have been assisting HIV-positive patients, including providing home-based care services, will be sent home, leaving the understaffed health facility to grapple with HIV management.
Across Uganda, PEPFAR has supported 20,809 health providers, including 929 doctors, 1,622 nurses and midwives, 750 Laboratory staff, and 12,551 community health workers. Beyond this healthcare workforce families have depended on these contracts as a source of income.
Richard Odaga, an Audio-Computer Assisted Self-Interviews (ACASI) data assistant at Biiso Health Centre IV, faces joblessness and potential suffering for his young family due to the shutdown.
USAID operated a budget of $50 billion, channelling foreign aid to countries in Asia, Africa, South America and the Middle East.
According to US Foreign Assistance data, US aid to Uganda has been approximately $710 million per year. A huge chunk of these funds over the years has enabled HIV/AIDS treatment and care to 1,416,800 Ugandans who are active on ARVs across 2,051 health centres.
As the world focuses on President Trump’s war on USAID, the Guardian reported on July 22, 2025, that the UK’s aid cut by 0.3% would negatively impact children’s education and increase disease and death risk in some African countries, according to the Government’s own impact assessment. Other European countries, including Belgium, Sweden and the Netherlands, are also in a rush to downsize their aid portfolios.
Joseph Pinytek Ochieno, a pundit on global governance and leadership candidate for Uganda People’s Congress (UPC), a social-democratic political party that ushered Uganda into Independence in 1962, holds the view that aid to Africa is rooted in the idea of moral responsibility and historical accountability.
He believes that it is criminal for the West, particularly imperialistic powers like the US and the UK, which have a long history of intervention in African affairs that has often been detrimental to the continent’s stability and development, to cut aid and to do so with a sense of arrogance and apparent racist extremism.
The West has orchestrated coups to overthrow democratically elected governments and installed puppets, destabilising leadership on the African continent to exploit natural resources in countries such as the DR Congo, and perpetuating economic systems that benefit imperialism at the expense of African nations.
While critics argue that the assault on the aid industry presents Africa with the opportunity to learn to survive on its own, Ochieno contends that aid is a moral obligation of the West and a good gesture toward reparations, given their role in African resources mismanagement and politics. It should promote sustainable development, rather than merely providing temporary relief, which is responsible for the current dependence syndrome on the continent.