Global health spending levels remain unresolved under 'fiscal cliff' deal

The "fiscal cliff" deal agreed to by Congress "leaves suspended in mid-air the fates of programs essential to meeting the goals of continued global health responses -- including the implementation of PEPFAR's blueprint for an AIDS-free generation, and whatever promise the new Office of Global Health Diplomacy will offer," the Center for Global Health Policy's "Science Speaks" blog reports. "But as it only postpones, but does not eliminate the threat of sequestration, it leaves open the possibility that [across-the-board eight percent cuts to current levels of government spending on most programs] could still come," the blog notes, adding, "[E]ven if another deal is reached to prevent indiscriminate cuts, what values that deal will put on global health and medical research remains a question" (Barton, 1/8).

Kaiser Family Foundation's Policy Tracker provides additional information on the "fiscal cliff" deal, known as the "American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012" (H.R. 8), which averts scheduled increases in income tax rates and postpones, until March 1, 2013, the sequestration process as required by the "Budget Control Act of 2011" (Public Law #112-25) (1/2).