Gov. Beshear says he will challenge Trump’s funding cuts to health-related grant programs in Kentucky

Kentucky’s health departments are set to lose nearly $150 million in health-related grants after the Trump administration announced it would cancel the state’s Covid-19 health care grants, Sylvia Goodman reports for Kentucky Public Radio.

The grant money is used for childhood vaccines, suicide prevention, community health workers and addiction treatment services, she writes.

Kendra Steele, a spokesperson for the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services, told Goodman that these cuts would delay some childhood vaccine orders, bi-annual vaccine provider re-enrollment and vaccination outreach, education and services programs.

“The cuts will also affect the Purple Star Program, which supports military-connected children, and the delivery of addiction treatment services. She said the Trump administration also eliminates a grant to develop community health workers across the state, and affects grants supporting staffing at youth drop-in centers and call centers for the 988 suicide prevention and crisis hotline,” Goodman writes.

These cancellations come as the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced it was canceling $11.4 billion in federal grants to state and local health departments during the Covid-19 pandemic. The funds were set to run through September.

HHS says it is making these cuts because the pandemic is over.

“The Covid-19 pandemic is over, and HHS will no longer waste billions of taxpayer dollars responding to a non-existent pandemic that Americans moved on from years ago,” the federal health department said in the termination notice.

In his Team Kentucky update on Thursday, March 27, Gov. Andy Beshear said he intends to challenge the grant cancellations.

“We have received notice of grants being canceled,” Beshear said. “It’s an unlawful cancellation and we’ll challenge it. These are contracts that we have. The contracts can only be terminated for cause, which means somebody did something wrong and they are trying to define cause as the pandemic’s over. That’s not a legal argument.”

Beshear also said he is worried about the 10,000 federal workers being laid off at HHS, especially with bird flu and measles outbreaks ongoing.