Women Are Collateral Damage: The Impacts of Dismantling USAID
How the dismantling of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) negatively impacts Zawadisha
USAID distributes tens of billions of taxpayer dollars annually toward poverty alleviation, disease prevention, and humanitarian causes. USAID focuses on the prevention and treatment of HIV, malaria, and tuberculosis—diseases that impact women and girls at disproportionate rates compared to men and boys—and they help to fund services that combat gender-based violence.
USAID isn't simply about aid; it's about keeping us safe
Their work isn’t wholly altruistic and it’s not a simple hand up (critics would use the term hand out) to the poorest people on the planet in the global south—their work is actively tied to the promotion of democracy, which benefits the global hierarchy that the US sits atop. This critical function has seemed to evade lawmakers and the general public, who don’t believe taxpayer dollars should fund international development. Little do they know USAID has helped to establish our global dominance in addition to keeping the United States and its citizens safe.
Terrorism is largely predicated on inequality in political and economic systems and USAID addresses the systemic inequality that fuels the growth of these groups. The senior director of government affairs at the American Farm Bureau Federation recently told The Washington Post that “Food stability is essential to political stability, and our food aid programs help feed the hungry, bolster our national security and provide an important market for our farmers, especially when commodity prices are low.”
When people are hungry and have little to no access to the formal job market, they will do just about anything to care for their families—they poach, sell illegal drugs and alcohol, turn to prostitution, and become more susceptible to radicalization. The way the administration is rapidly closing USAID doesn’t give communities or countries the runway they need to ease the suffering or develop a new plan. The fallout from diminished public health and humanitarian assistance to Africa will fuel the perception of abandonment. It will create a vacuum for insurgents to exploit and compromise the safety of Americans everywhere, furthering damage to long-term diplomatic relations. USAID is needed because the military alone cannot win all wars.
Women are the collateral damage in this experiment
The disruptions to the agency have already had horrific impacts on women and children in particular. USAID focuses on the prevention and treatment of HIV, malaria, and tuberculosis—diseases that impact women and girls at disproportionate rates compared to men and boys—and they help to fund services that combat gender-based violence.
And this is precisely what will affect Zawadisha.
In our community, the USAID workers have been fired. The drugs that would have kept people's HIV from accelerating into AIDS are no longer available. People will get much sicker, and they will die. Getting sick and paying for funerals is expensive, and that means the women we work with won't have the ability to repay their loans or take new loans. So while Zawadisha doesn't receive any government funding, we can't be successful when our customer base is sick, dying, and mourning.
That might feel like a lot to read and absorb, but we need to start speaking and hearing the truth. It is an absolute fact that when women and their children are cared for, the world is a better place: economies are stronger, nations are more stable, and communities thrive. We're going to keep fighting for that, and we hope you do too.