SACHA PFEIFFER, HOST:
For decades, when it came to providing HIV prevention and care, community-based organizations were on the front lines. They were directly funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Now, the money will instead go to state health departments. As KOSU's Sierra Pfeifer reports, the funding shift could affect the most vulnerable populations.
SIERRA PFEIFER, BYLINE: Theodore Noel knows his community. In the late '90s, Noel, who is Black, worked as a counselor at an elementary school in Oklahoma City. There, he says many minority students were struggling.
THEODORE NOEL: The students was living with, you know, extended family members, their neighbors because their parents were infected with HIV.
PFEIFER: Noel says few local organizations were offering targeted HIV prevention to people of color.
NOEL: And during that time, it's like, we didn't feel comfortable going to someone that not necessarily might look like me or have some of the same values or just culturally inappropriate. So they were just self-medicating as much as they could.
PFEIFER: So Noel designed an organization for Black people and minorities called Guiding Right.
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NOEL: This is the medical wing. Patient will be seen here first, get all their vitals and everything.
PFEIFER: The nonprofit meets people where they are. The clinic is right behind a gay bar and does outreach at barbershops and clubs. Twenty-one-year-old patient Rowan Carbajal (ph) says staff at the clinic made him feel comfortable opening up about his identity.
ROWAN CARBAJAL: And they'll be sure to check up on you, not only with your weight, your health, your mental state, but also just make sure that you're doing OK as a whole.
PFEIFER: Guiding Right is one of nearly a hundred community-based organizations that got some direct federal funding from the CDC - more than $441,000 a year. That would pay for four staff members, some testing and medicine. While only a small part of its overall budget, Noel says the cuts came without a warning.
NOEL: That's kind of a slap in the face.
PFEIFER: Instead, the CDC is now funding HIV prevention through state and local health departments. In a statement, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services says it's a way for the CDC to streamline HIV prevention funding. But Lindsey Dawson, an HIV expert with the nonprofit health policy research group KFF, says cutting direct CDC funding for HIV prevention groups follows a broader trend under President Trump.
LINDSEY DAWSON: Community-based organizations have been successful in their work because they reach communities that are disproportionately impacted by HIV. So this often includes people of color and transgender people. And the administration has specifically said that it doesn't recognize transgender people and has worked to pull back on funding that's directed at individuals or groups based on race, ethnicity.
PFEIFER: In the case of Oklahoma, the state's health department did get a million dollars to prevent HIV. And while the agency already funds some parts of Guiding Right, it's unclear if it will make up the $441,000 the group is set to lose. If the money doesn't trickle down to the nonprofit, Noel says he'll have to lay off staff and reduce services.
NOEL: And the populations that we serve, they are very distrusting. You know, are you the police? What are you doing? Are you from the health department? Or I - you know, I might not have legal status. We don't care about all of that. We're just here to provide that services.
PFEIFER: He worries that the new HIV prevention funding model won't fully reach minority populations. For NPR News, I'm Sierra Pfeifer in Oklahoma City.
PFEIFFER: This story was co-reported by Jillian Taylor.
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