Dallas County forced to lay off 21 health workers, cancel vaccination events
Federal grant freeze impact Dallas County Health
Dallas County Commissioners are learning the real impact of two federal health grants totaling $70 million that have been put on hold.
DALLAS - Dallas County Commissioners are learning the real impact of two federal health grants totaling $70 million that have been put on hold.
Some county health workers have already been laid off, and dozens of community events planned to provide immunizations against diseases have been scrapped.
Federal Health Funding Freezes
The backstory:
The Trump administration pulled back $11.4 billion in federal grants allocated during the COVID-19 pandemic, stating that the government should no longer waste taxpayer dollars on a nonexistent pandemic.
Several Democratic states filed a lawsuit on Tuesday, hoping to halt the funding cuts.
The Centers for Disease Control is also hoping to recover some, if not all, of that funding. For now, however, that is not certain.
Dallas County Commissioner’s React
What they're saying:
Dallas County Health and Human Services Director Dr. Phillip Huang told commissioners on Tuesday that the freeze on federal grants allocated to health departments across the country is already having a negative impact.
"We had to lay off 11 staff on Friday, also 10 temporary workers. Many of them were some of the immunization staff. So, you know how I normally provide a list of our upcoming community immunization clinics. As a result, and these are due to the federal cuts that we were just notified of last week, essentially we’re having to cancel approximately 50 plus events," Dr. Huang said.
The events include some that were just recently scheduled at schools to provide children with the measles vaccine.
Texas measles outbreak 2025: Cases reported in 2 new counties, total rises to 422
State health officials reported 22 new cases Tuesday.
The lost funding weakens the county’s best defense against the highly contagious disease.
"I want to make sure that the community understands what the federal government has done to us in terms of putting us at risk," said Commissioner Andrew Sommerman.
Big picture view:
The county’s pop-up community vaccination clinics, which started during the COVID-19 pandemic, have continued to offer other vaccinations.
"The funding may have been labeled as COVID but it extends far beyond just the COVID impact. We were giving COVID vaccinations. We were giving flu vaccines. But we’re also giving childhood vaccines, too," Dr. Huang said.
Those have now stopped.
Dallas County Health loses $70M in federal funding
Dallas County’s health department is scrambling to save jobs after losing two federal grants totaling $70 million.
"What is your backup plan with what you have left in terms of outreach?" asked Commissioner John Wiley Price.
Dr. Huang said the county will go back to vaccinating as many people as possible at its seven satellite health clinics.
"Our brick and mortar centers are the main ones where we provide the most services. That is our backup and we will continue to maintain those. And in talking to the staff, that’s all we can keep staffing," Dr. Huang said.
Commissioner Price has concerns.
"40% of my district is still transportation hostage," he said.
"What we hope will happen is that we will be able to identify people that need a ride and through partnerships with people who are holding community events, through churches, with spending some money ourselves, we’ll be able to get everybody to our brick and mortar sites," Judge Clay Jenkins said.
The Source: The information in this story comes from Tuesday morning's Dallas County Commissioner's Court meeting.