879 - The Impacts of Terminating COVID-era Funding for States
Public Health On Call
The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
4.8 • 620 Ratings
🗓️ 7 April 2025
⏱️ 13 minutes
🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS
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Summary
About this episode:
The Department of Health and Human Services’s abrupt termination of $11 billion in health funding to states has interrupted projects across the country. In this episode, a look at one state—Connecticut—where the state with federal approval had been using the funding to upgrade aging technology and respond to urgent threats like measles. Note: This conversation was recorded prior to a federal judge’s issuing of a temporary restraining order blocking the cuts—for now.
Guest:
Dr. Manisha Juthani is the Commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Public Health.
Host:
Dr. Josh Sharfstein is vice dean for public health practice and community engagement at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, a faculty member in health policy, a pediatrician, and former secretary of Maryland’s Health Department.
Show links and related content:
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U.S. Judge blocks $11 billion Trump administration health funding cut for now—Reuters
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CT has 69 public health contracts canceled after Trump funding cuts, issues stop work orders—CT Insider
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to Public Health On Call, a podcast from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, |
| 0:05.9 | where we bring evidence, experience, and perspective to make sense of today's leading health challenges. |
| 0:16.3 | If you have questions or ideas for us, please send an email to public health question at jhh.edu. |
| 0:23.8 | That's public health question at jhhu.edu for future podcast episodes. |
| 0:31.2 | It's Lindsay Smith Rogers. |
| 0:33.3 | Today, the impact of surprise federal budget cuts on a state health department. |
| 0:38.7 | Dr. Manisha Jutani is the Health Commissioner of Connecticut. |
| 0:42.5 | She speaks to Dr. Josh Starfstein about the recent decision by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services |
| 0:47.9 | to abruptly stop $11 billion in state grants that were provided as part of the COVID response. Just to note that |
| 0:56.5 | this episode was recorded prior to a federal judge's issuing of a temporary restraining order on the |
| 1:03.1 | cuts. Let's listen. Dr. Manisha Chutani, thank you so much for joining me today on public health |
| 1:09.4 | on call. How are you doing today? |
| 1:11.7 | It's been a rough day in public health. It sure has. It's been a rough few days in public health. |
| 1:19.0 | What is top of mind for you today? Well, we had almost $150 million cut last week in critical funding that was helping to support public health |
| 1:31.8 | initiatives for the people of Connecticut. Tell me more about that. What kind of initiatives? |
| 1:37.4 | So we had funding in six different grants, all of which were canceled effective immediately. And the types of programs that |
| 1:47.7 | were funded involved setting up laboratory systems that help show people, cases of flu and |
| 1:57.5 | RSV and COVID, immunizations, and the like. And all of those updates have had to come to a halt. |
| 2:06.5 | So I want to take a step back to understand what Connecticut was working on with these federal funds and what you're |
| 2:12.6 | losing as those funds may go away or have gone away. Take me back to the pandemic. You became |
| 2:21.4 | health commissioner in the middle of the pandemic. What were the systems that were straining or failing |
| 2:27.5 | within public health that you became aware of? Everybody knows and remembers back to the early |
... |
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