Blog | 4/18/2025

Trump Administration Healthcare News: April 18, 2025

Health Advances weekly healthcare tracker focused on top level government administration news.

NOTE: All words/analysis are those from the source noted, opinions are those of the original authors and not reflective of Health Advances in general nor any individual. All sources are non-confidential and in the public domain (but some may be behind paywalls).

This issue reflects news as of 11 AM on April 17, 2025. The details and broad themes may have changed.

 

KEY FEDERAL GOVERNMENT NEWS

Internal Trump administration document reveals massive budget cut proposal for federal health agencies

  • The Trump administration is formulating plans to cut roughly a third of the federal health budget, eliminate dozens of programs and vastly whittle down health agencies, according to an internal document reviewed by CNN.
  • The preliminary memo, sent from White House budget officials to the Department of Health and Human Services, previews the administration’s plans to slash discretionary federal health spending and rework health agencies.
  • The document, dated April 10, could still be finalized with changes. If enacted as is, it could cut total federal health spending by tens of billions of dollars a year. It would also consolidate dozens of health programs and departments into the Administration for a Healthy America (AHA), a new entity unveiled by Kennedy during mass layoffs earlier this month.
  • The plan calls for steep cuts to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which would see its budget reduced by more than 40% under the administration’s proposal.
  • It also eliminates CDC’s global health center and programs focused on chronic disease prevention, and domestic HIV/AIDS prevention.
  • The proposal would also eliminate a number of rural health programs at HHS, including grants and residency programs for rural hospitals and state offices. Other rural health efforts, such as black lung clinics, would remain but be housed in the new AHA’s primary care department.
  • The preliminary plan would slash the National Institutes of Health’s budget by more than 40% and reduce its 27 research institutes and centers down to just eight.
  • While the National Cancer Institute, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and the National Institute on Aging would be preserved. Institutes researching childhood illnesses, mental health, chronic disease, disabilities and substance abuse would be shuffled into five new entities: the National Institute on Body Systems, National Institute on Neuroscience and Brain Research, National Institute of General Medical Sciences, the National Institute of Disability Related Research and National Institute of Behavioral Health.
  • https://www.cnn.com/2025/04/16/politics/trump-rfk-jr-budget-cut-health/index.html

Supreme Court to hear challenge to ACA rule requiring free preventive care, cancer screenings

  • For a decade and a half, Americans have been guaranteed that no matter their health insurer, certain preventive care like cancer screenings are free of charge. That’s because an Affordable Care Act provision has required insurers to fully cover services given an A or B recommendation by an expert task force.
  • That may soon change. On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear a challenge to this statute in the case of Kennedy v. Braidwood Management. Either way the court decides, legal and medical experts told STAT, the ruling could have profound ramifications for the future of preventive health care in the United States.
  • Striking down this ACA provision means insurers can deny coverage for many of the services the United States Preventive Services Task Force, a volunteer panel of experts, recommended after the ACA’s passage. Those services include statins, HIV prevention drugs called PrEP, breast cancer prevention medications, lung cancer screening, and colorectal cancer screening at the age of 45 to 49.
  • https://www.statnews.com/2025/04/17/kennedy-v-braidwood-affordable-care-act-challenge-could-upend-preventive-health-care/  (subscription required for full-text)

Beyond Ivy League, RFK Jr.’s NIH Slashed Science Funding Across States That Backed Trump

  • A KFF Health News analysis underscores that the terminations are sparing no part of the country, politically or geographically. About 40% of organizations whose grants the NIH cut in its first month of slashing, which started Feb. 28, are in states Trump won in November.
  • The Trump administration has singled out Ivy League universities including Columbia and Harvard for broad federal funding cuts. But the spending reductions at the NIH, the nation’s foremost source of funding for biomedical research, go much further: Of about 220 organizations that had grants terminated, at least 94 were public universities, including flagship state schools in places such as Florida, Georgia, Ohio, Nebraska, and Texas.
  • KFF Health News found that the NIH terminated about 780 grants or parts of grants between Feb. 28 and March 28, based on documents published by the Department of Health and Human Services and a list maintained by academic researchers. Some grants were canceled in full, while in other cases, only supplements — extra funding related to the main grant, usually for a shorter-term, related project — were terminated.
  • https://kffhealthnews.org/news/article/nih-grant-cuts-red-states-science-research-vaccines-hiv-trump-rfk/

Anti-Reg EO Puts Biden-Era NIH ‘Patient Access’ Plan In Crosshairs

  • New calls by the Trump administration for agencies and industry to target regulations that aren’t dictated by statute puts a controversial Biden-era accessibility plan for products developed with NIH-funded research in the crosshairs, pharmaceutical intellectual property proponents say.
  • At issue is a yet-to-be implemented National Institutes of Health policy that would require anyone seeking to license certain NIH-owned patents to submit an “access plan” detailing how they will ensure their products are available to underserved patient populations.
  • https://insidehealthpolicy.com/inside-drug-pricing-daily-news/anti-reg-eo-puts-biden-era-nih-patient-access-plan-crosshairs  (subscription required for full-text)

KEY BIOPHARMA NEWS

Administration Lays Out Drug Pricing Plan Through Executive Order

  • On Tuesday, April 15, President Trump issued an executive order focused on “lowering drug prices by once again putting Americans first.”
  • This lengthy order instructs a range of executive actors to engage in drug pricing-related issues, both on their own and through working with Congress.
  • Many of the directions included in the order will be familiar to those who watched drug pricing policy closely during the first Trump Administration, though the portions of the order relating to the Inflation Reduction Act’s (IRA) Medicare drug price negotiation program are more novel.
    • First, the order references the guidance expected to be issued soon regarding the initial price applicability year 2028 cycle of the negotiation program, instructing HHS to use the guidance to “improve the transparency of the Medicare Drug Price Negotiation Program, prioritize the selection of prescription drugs with high costs to the Medicare program, and minimize any negative impacts of the maximum fair price on pharmaceutical innovation within the United States.”
    • Second, the order instructs a range of executive branch officials to “provide recommendations to the President on how best to stabilize and reduce Medicare Part D premiums.” 
    • Third, the order directs HHS to “work with the Congress to modify the Medicare Drug Price Negotiation Program to align the treatment of small molecule prescription drugs with that of biological products, ending the distortion that undermines relative investment in small molecule prescription drugs, coupled with other reforms to prevent any increase in overall costs to Medicare and its beneficiaries.” 
  • Many of the proposals in the executive order either repeat or are closely related to proposals advanced during the first Trump Administration. Consider Section 10, “Increasing Prescription Drug Importation to Lower Prices.” This section instructs the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to “streamline and improve” its existing drug importation program “to make it easier for States to obtain approval without sacrificing safety or quality.”
  • Other instructions in the order are worth highlighting for their broader context. Take Section 9, “Accelerating Competition for High-Cost Prescription Drugs.” This Section instructs FDA to “provid[e] administrative and legislative recommendations to” “accelerate approval of generics, biosimilars, combination products, and second-in-class brand name medications,” among other instructions.
  • The order is also notable, perhaps, for what it does not include—at least not explicitly. The order includes references to pharmaceutical companies charging “patients in our Nation more than those in other countries for the exact same prescription drugs.” In President Trump’s first term in late 2020, he sought to change this by finalizing a rule to use international reference pricing in Medicare Part B.
  • The rule was blocked by multiple courts as a violation of the Administrative Procedure Act.
  • https://www.healthaffairs.org/content/forefront/administration-lays-out-drug-pricing-plan-through-executive-order
  • EO: https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/04/lowering-drug-prices-by-once-again-putting-americans-first/

Pharma tariffs to arrive in ‘a month or two’: 4 things to know

  • President Donald Trump has threatened tariffs on pharmaceutical imports, with U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick confirming that the tariffs will be implemented “in a month or two,” ABC News reported April 13.
  • “Semiconductors and pharmaceuticals will have a tariff model in order to encourage them to reshore, to be built in America,” Mr. Lutnick said. “We need our medicines, and we need semiconductors and our electronics to be built in America.”
  • “We can’t be beholden and rely upon foreign countries for fundamental things that we need,” he said.
  • Here are four things to know:
    • President Trump claims pharmaceutical tariffs will cause companies “to leave China,” and set up in the U.S., however experts are skeptical.
    • J&J chief executive officer Joaquin Duato added that the tariffs on medications risk disrupting supply chains and driving up costs.
    • Major pharmacy companies have begun to expand U.S. manufacturing with Eli Lilly announcing $23 billion in projects.
    • Instead of lowering prices, reshoring manufacturing can do the opposite, according to the Politico report.
  • https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/cardiology/pharma-tariffs-to-arrive-in-the-next-month-or-two-4-things-to-know/
  • Politico report: https://www.politico.eu/article/us-donald-trump-pharma-tariffs-drug-production/

With looming Trump tariffs, pharma companies demand changes to stay in EU

  • Pharma companies are leveraging the United States’ threat of tariffs on drug imports to push for policy changes in the EU.
  • In a letter sent to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, 32 pharma companies demanded more favorable policies in order for them to maintain operations in the EU amid the threat of U.S. tariffs. The letter was reported earlier by French newspaper Les Echos.
  • The CEOs of Amgen, AstraZeneca, Biogen, Bristol Myers Squibb, Eli Lilly, Gilead Sciences, GSK, Merck & Co., Novartis, Novo Nordisk, Pfizer, Roche, Sanofi and Takeda were among those who signed on to the letter, according to a copy obtained by Fierce Pharma.
  • The letter, dated April 11, is a follow-up from a meeting between industry CEOs and von der Leyen about how to help make the EU more competitive, a spokesperson for the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (EFPIA) told Fierce Pharma.
  • The firms voiced their concerns in a statement published by EFPIA last week. In it, they warned von der Leyen of an EU pharma investment exodus to the U.S.—potentially worth as much as 103.2 billion euros ($113 billion) by 2029—unless Europe implements “rapid, radical" policy changes to counter upcoming U.S. drug tariffs from the Trump administration.
  • In the letter, the pharma leaders again warned that much of the development and manufacturing of medicines in Europe will be redirected to the U.S. if the region doesn’t provide “clear signals and radical policy change.”
  • https://www.fiercepharma.com/pharma/looming-trump-tariffs-pharma-companies-demand-changes-stay-eu

Abbott to Expand US Manufacturing as Tariffs Loom

  • Abbott Laboratories will make new investments in US manufacturing, with the impact of tariffs on medical devices and diagnostics looming over the industry.
  • It expects to spend $500 million on two facilities, located in Illinois and Texas, Abbott said in a statement Wednesday.
  • The investments are to expand existing plants and boost US research and development for Abbott’s transfusion business, which is responsible for screening the US blood supply.
  • https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-16/abbott-to-build-new-us-manufacturing-with-tariff-threat-looming  (subscription required for full-text)

State AGs Demand Congress Ban PBMs From Owning Pharmacies

  • Members of the National Association of Attorneys General are pressing congressional leadership to pass legislation barring pharmacy benefit managers and their parent insurance companies from owning pharmacy businesses.
  • In a letter sent Monday (April 14), they cite the increasing influence of PBMs in the drug market due to consolidation and vertical integration as a key factor of the country’s issues with high, manipulated drug prices and the inaccessibility of medicines for patients. 
  • https://insidehealthpolicy.com/daily-news/state-ags-demand-congress-ban-pbms-owning-pharmacies   (subscription required for full-text)

Pharma Under the Antitrust Microscope

  • Axinn partner Lisl Dunlop moderated a panel entitled “Pharma Under the Antitrust Microscope,” which outlined the legal and economic aspects of several new and emerging antitrust theories in the pharmaceutical industry. 
  • Bundled Rebates. The panel highlighted a recent focus of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) on the potential for large drug manufacturers to foreclose rivals and increase pricing through the practice of bundling rebates with Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs),
  • PBMs. Panelists explored increased FTC scrutiny of PBMs themselves.
  • Harm to Innovation. Panelists discussed innovation theories of harm in FTC reviews of pharmaceutical mergers.
  • Harm to Potential Competition. Another recent trend involves the pursuit by the FTC of potential competition theories of harm.
  • Delisting Improper Patents from the Orange Book. The panel highlighted that the FTC is signaling a more assertive enforcement stance on improper Orange Book patent listings.
  • https://www.axinn.com/en/insights/axinn-viewpoints/axinn-associates-at-the-antitrust-spring-meeting-pharma-under-the-antitrust-micr?id=102k8iw

FDA plans to end animal testing requirements for monoclonal antibody drugs

  • The FDA is moving away from requiring animal models for investigational new drug (IND) applications for new monoclonal antibodies and some other drug candidates.
  • Animal testing will be "reduced, refined or potentially replaced" by a suite of new approach methodologies (NAMs), including computational models and human cell lines and organoids.
  • To make determinations about efficacy, the FDA said it plans to use pre-existing, real-world safety data from other countries where the drug has already been studied in humans.
  • Unlike the more sudden changes at the FDA and other health agencies recently, animal testing will be phased out over a period of time, according to the announcement.
  • https://www.fiercebiotech.com/cro/fda-announces-plan-end-animal-testing-requirements-monoclonal-antibody-drugs

RFK Jr. plans changes to vaccine injury reporting system

  • Health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Tuesday that he plans to roll out changes to the vaccine injury monitoring system that would automate and increase data collection as well as look for negative impacts of the shots.
  • Reforming the current Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System has long been part of Kennedy’s agenda to raise questions about the safety of immunizations that are currently in use.
  • While the general idea of improving the system is uncontroversial, Kennedy has exaggerated the extent to which side effects of vaccinations go unrecorded, according to researchers.
  • “It’s outrageous that we don’t have a surveillance system that functions,” he said at a Make America Healthy Again event in Indiana, noting that the agency would add datasets to study the effects of vaccinations.
  • https://www.statnews.com/2025/04/15/rfk-jr-remarks-vaccine-adverse-event-reporting-system-vaers-changes-indiana-maha/  (subscription required for full-text)

HHS abruptly terminates funding for Atlanta biotech’s next-gen vaccine study

  • The U.S. government continues to end contracts related to the $5 billion Project NextGen initiative, this time terminating funding for an Atlanta biotech’s lead COVID-19 vaccine program that’s currently being tested in a mid-stage trial.
  • The Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) has axed a Project NextGen (PNG) award for GeoVax Labs, effective April 11, the Georgia company said in an April 16 release. The funding was for GEO-CM04S1, a phase 2b multi-antigen COVID-19 vaccine designed to protect individuals who aren’t sufficiently shielded by vaccines currently on the market.
  • HHS and BARDA did not return Fierce's request for comment.
  • The scenario echoes the recent experience of Vaxart, a California-based company that laid off 10% of its staff in March after the government ordered the biotech to stop work on a trial of its investigational COVID-19 vaccine pill.
  • https://www.fiercebiotech.com/biotech/hhs-abruptly-terminates-funding-atlanta-biotechs-trio-studies

KEY DIAGNOSTICS – LIFE SCIENCE RESEARCH NEWS

Trump Tariffs Strain Science Research Budgets for Lab Equipment

  • Import taxes on essential laboratory equipment and supplies now range from 10 percent to as much as 54 percent, significantly increasing the cost structure of doing science, according to a recent Nature report.
  • A survey of U.S. biotech companies showed that nearly 90 percent rely on imported components for at least half of FDA-approved products, and the tariffs would hurt their business, according to BIO, the organization that conducted the outreach.
  • “This survey demonstrates the far-reaching and potentially damaging impacts of the proposed tariffs on our biotechnology industry, on biomedical research and on patients,” said BIO President & CEO John F. Crowley in a statement.
  • Nine organizations including patient advocacy groups and associations for home healthcare workers, hospitals, medical colleges, dentists and medical product distributors published a letter warning about the potential fallout from higher prices of instruments and supplies.
  • https://wewillcure.com/insights/medtech/trump-tariffs-strain-science-research-budgets-for-lab-equipment

KEY HEALTH INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (HIT) NEWS

Trump Budget Draft Includes Cuts To Digital Health Offices, Activities

  • President Donald Trump’s HHS budget draft for fiscal 2026 envisions slashing key digital health funding, including dollars for the department’s chief health IT office (ASTP/ONC), according to a “pre-decisional” document obtained by Inside Health Policy.
  • While Congress will need to reach a final budget, the HHS budget draft offers a first look at how the Trump administration plans to steer digital health funding and reorganize crucial offices. 
  • https://insidehealthpolicy.com/daily-news/trump-budget-draft-includes-cuts-digital-health-offices-activities  (subscription required for full-text)

The VA EHR modernization roadmap under the Trump administration

  • Efforts by the newly established Department of Government Efficiency are charting a new path forward that could significantly enhance information technology modernization efforts across government agencies, including the VA.
  • Former Rep. Doug Collins, the new VA secretary under President Trump, has emphasized the importance of bolstering community care and leveraging emerging innovations to enhance the VA’s mission.
  • One of his key priorities is improving the rollout of the VA’s Electronic Health Records Modernization (EHRM) program.
  • The challenges surrounding the VA’s EHRM program have been well documented. However, the focus should now shift toward ensuring its future success. Under the new VA leadership, this entails maintaining legacy systems like VistA while prioritizing the seamless rollout of the EHRM program.
  • https://federalnewsnetwork.com/commentary/2025/04/the-va-ehr-modernization-roadmap-under-the-trump-administration/

KEY MEDTECH NEWS

Medical product manufacturers are divided over Trump’s tariffs

  • Medical technology, medical device and hospital trade groups are pushing the Trump administration for tariff exemptions on medical equipment.
  • Medical devices and protective gear made in China, Mexico and Canada were exempt from duties during the first Trump administration, but so far have not gotten a reprieve from his newest round of levies.
  • While device makers who would take a big hit from the tariffs are pushing for a new carve out, the makers of personal protective equipment — who stand to benefit from the barriers — are not. 
  • J&J forecasts $400 million tariff impact on its MedTech division.
  • U.S. makers of personal protection equipment are applauding the new tariffs on Chinese goods, hoping they will help level the playing field here at home.
  • For American-based medical device and protective gear manufacturers, one strategy now is to shift international production to Mexico and Canada, where they can potentially secure exemptions for products made under USMCA.
  • https://www.cnbc.com/2025/04/16/medical-product-manufacturers-are-divided-over-trumps-tariffs.html

KEY HEALTH NEWS (Global & US & EOs)

WHO member countries agree on a draft ‘pandemic treaty’ to try to avoid COVID-19 mistakes

  • Five years after COVID-19 triggered national lockdowns, economic uncertainty and killed millions, the World Health Organization’s member countries agreed on a draft “pandemic treaty” that sets guidelines for how the international community might confront the next global health crisis.
  • After the world’s largely disastrous response to the coronavirus, countries tasked the WHO with overseeing a pandemic treaty in 2021. Negotiations concluded early Wednesday on an agreement expected to be adopted next month at the U.N. health agency’s annual meeting in Geneva.
  • WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus heralded it as a historic moment, saying countries have proven that “in our divided world, nations can still work together to find common ground and a shared response.”
  • Following U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw the country from the WHO in January, American officials were barred from participating in the talks by the Trump administration and are not expected to sign the treaty.
  • https://apnews.com/article/who-pandemic-treaty-covid-trump-9003e25d3a9dda95277a9f79cbf77a1d

White House Will Ask Congress To Cut PEPFAR By About 40%

  • The White House is looking to cut 40% of funding for the United States President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) program, according to internal budget documents detailing White House budget office input on the State Department’s draft budget request for fiscal 2026.
  • The documents, reviewed by Inside Health Policy , call for $4.6 billion for global health, which is $5.4 billion -- or 54% -- less than fiscal 2025-enacted levels.
  • https://insidehealthpolicy.com/daily-news/white-house-will-ask-congress-cut-pepfar-about-40  (subscription required for full-text)

Updated April 17 at 11 AM EST.

KEY ACRONYMS

  • ACA = Affordable Care Act
  • AG = Attorneys General
  • AHA = Administration for a Healthy America
  • BARDA = Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority
  • CDC = Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
  • CMS = Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services
  • EHRM = Electronic Health Records Modernization
  • EO = Executive Order
  • FDA = Food and Drug Administration
  • FTC = Federal Trade Commission
  • HHS = Department of Health and Human Services
  • IRA = Inflation Reduction Act
  • MAHA = Make America Healthy Again
  • NAM = new approach methodologies
  • NIH = National Institutes of Health
  • PBMs = Pharmacy Benefit Managers
  • PEPFAR = President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief
  • PNG = Project NextGen
  • USMCA = United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement
  • VA = Veteran’s Administration
  • WHO = World Health Organization

 

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