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USAID - United States Agency for International Development Officially Ceases to Exist Starting from Today


USAID has saved over 91 million lives during its existence. It is projected that cuts to USAID programming will lead to over 14 million people dying globally in the next 10 years. Those that are going to be mostly impacted are the low and middle-income countries in Africa, Central - South America, and South East Asia. There are a few rich countries that will lose support as well. For every $1 spent on aid globally before this cut, $0.40 (40%) came from the US. This made the US the global leader that has been looked upon by the rest of the world, post WWII. This has been a strong leverage for the US to influence nations without shooting bunker-busting bombs at them.

The decision to cut USAID was partly political and in some way, necessary. The latter could have been done in a humane way, not suddenly, but in a way that reduces true waste and duplication of effort and not create shock. The latter is worse - the argument that US is wasting money overseas, and that it is helping the global community to be self-sufficient in order to give tax cuts to the richest 1% of the 1% - the likes of Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, etc, is an inconceivable argument to make by a billionaire president. The sad thing is that the man who led the dismantling of USAID is the richest man alive... He does not need the money, but he does not see the good that this money is doing all over the world... Infant babies will die, HIV patients would die from the disease because they could no longer afford their medicine, many people in draught struck regions will die without external support, farmers and contractors who will lose their means of livelihood, and so many professionals who have built a life for decades in implementing many of these programs will be pupperized because they have no other skills. Even if USAID is returned to its former state today, a lot of harm has been done already... Unfortunately, it might never come back, even if there is another government from another party that opposes the cut now. This should never have happened to an agency mandated by Congress... But this is a new era... there is a new king in town that has been empowered by the other arms of government, that is supposed to help check excessive power - Congress and SCOTUS... History will judge this moment ... the projection is that it will not be awesome, especially that it will lead to the death of many...

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