Leaked Department of Health and Human Services Budget Proposes to Eliminate Federal Funding for TBI Programs
April 18, 2025
The Brain Injury Association of America is categorically opposed to the proposed elimination, restructuring, and funding cuts to brain injury programs within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
A leaked HHS budget draft, obtained by the Washington Post and Politico, shows that the Administration seeks to deeply slash budgets for federal health programs by cutting discretionary spending for HHS by approximately one-third. The 64-page document calls for cutting some programs entirely while shuffling and restructuring other health and human service agencies, as well as creating a new $20 billion agency named the Administration for a Healthy America, which would include pieces of other agencies that are being consolidated. Many brain injury programs are among the proposed cuts.
“The changes and cuts outlined in this budget draft will be devastating for the millions of Americans who are living with brain injury, not to mention the millions more who will be injured in the future,” said Rick Willis, President and CEO of the Brain Injury Association of America. “This proposal shows that brain injury programs are being deprioritized within HHS, which is unacceptable.”
Programs that would be eliminated include:
- CDC’s HEADS UP Program, the nation’s leading concussion education initiative
- The National Concussion Surveillance System, the only comprehensive source of national brain injury data
- TBI Model Systems, critical hubs for long-term rehabilitation research and care
Last week, Science reported that the team of five scientists researching traumatic brain injury at the CDC’s Injury Center were fired earlier this month. The team, focused on research, surveillance, and public guidance on brain injuries, published guidelines for physicians, compiled death and injury data, and trained millions of people in the United States on concussion prevention and treatment.
What You Can Do
Ask Your Representative to Sign the Luttrell-Deluzio Letter: Rep. Chris Deluzio (D-Pa.) and Rep. Morgan Luttrell (R-Texas), co-chairs of the Congressional Brain Injury Task Force, have written a bipartisan Appropriations Letter, which calls on Congress to protect and sustain funding for vital brain injury programs in the upcoming federal budget. Contact your House representative today and urge them to sign the letter.
The proposed elimination of brain injury programs under the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the reassignment of programs under the Administration for Community Living (ACL) would roll back decades of progress that America has made towards treatment and prevention of this epidemic that affects millions of Americans of all ages, genders, races, backgrounds, and walks of life, including children, veterans, and first responders.