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US seeks new aid model with health deals

Dec 11, 2025, 7:50am EST
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Kampala
Abubaker Lubowa/Reuters

Uganda and the US signed a $1.7 billion health financing deal, part of Washington’s new “America First” approach to foreign aid.

The strategy promotes US-made goods in foreign assistance programs, and the Trump administration has already reached similar agreements with Kenya and Rwanda. Uganda agreed to increase its own health spending by $500 million “to gradually assume greater financial responsibility,” Washington said.

US President Donald Trump is remaking aid in his own image, an expert wrote for Semafor: It has become “wholly transactional,” and recipient states must treat the US as a business partner. It’s an ambitious shift that relies on client governments doing hard policy work, which could be “visionary. Or delusional.”

A scatter plot comparing GDP per capita to aid given per capita
AD