Coronavirus USA Update: Trump Cuts Health Budget, WHO Funding Amid nCov Outbreak

House Democrats are again expected to reject, as they did in 2019, president Donald Trump's new proposals to slash U.S. funding for foreign assistance, including global health, in his proposed federal budget for 2020-21.

Trump's renewed gutting of U.S. spending to support global healthcare and healthcare organizations worldwide in his new budget mirrors his attempt to do so in the 2019-2020 budget. House Democrats rejected many of Trump's more severe health cuts to the current budget and are again expected to do so this time around as Trump is proposing even more damaging cutbacks.

In this new budget proposal, Trump wants to slash $65 million in U.S. funding for the World Health Organization (WHO), which is now at the forefront of the fight against Novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) outbreak ravaging China and affecting 26 other countries and territories worldwide.

Trump's proposed U.S. contribution to WHO is 50% lower than the organization's current budget. Trump's budget proposal also wants a 34% overall cut to Global Health Programs.

Trump is again asking Congress, as he did last year, to make major cuts to the budgets of science and health agencies while favoring research he claims is vital to U.S. national security.

Trump's previous budgets have repeatedly sought to slash the budgets of agencies and programs dealing with science, health and the environment. Democrats, however, have foiled Trump's cuts before and are expected to do so this time since they still control the House of Representatives, which has the power of the purse.

"We’ve been down this road before," a Senate aide said. "They (Trump and the Republicans) don’t seem to learn anything."

This person said the White House has been trying unsuccessfully for three years to impose steep cuts in global health programs Congress supports.

Trump new budget is being assailed by nonprofit organizations advocating research.

“The administration’s proposed budget cuts to research risk slowing our nation’s science just when it is reaping benefits for all Americans in the forms of better health, a stronger economy, a more sustainable environment, a safer world, and awe-inspiring understanding,” said Sudip Parikh, chief executive of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Chris McEntee, CEO and executive director of the American Geophysical Union, said Trump's proposed budget "is a severe disappointment for science and ignores the many ways in which science fuels our economy, safeguards our security, improves our health and well-being, and is critical for a thriving future."