The Trump administration is phasing out funding for the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, known as PEPFAR, in South Africa, Semafor reported Thursday, citing a State Department official and two congressional aides briefed on the decision.

PEPFAR has provided more than $8 billion to South Africa since its founding under President George W. Bush, according to the National Library of Medicine. South Africa has about 7.8 million people living with HIV, the world's largest HIV-positive population, according to World Health Organization data. A Senate aide told Semafor on Thursday that PEPFAR funding for healthcare workers will continue into 2027, while program awards will wind down later this year.

Leo Brent Bozell III, the U.S. ambassador to South Africa, is expected to meet with officials from South Africa’s Ministry of Health as soon as next week to inform them of the decision, according to Semafor.

“The United States has decided to initiate a phased drawdown of PEPFAR programming in South Africa following South Africa’s failure to make demonstrable progress on policy requests by the administration,” the State Department official told Semafor.

A State Department official separately told Politico on Thursday that the drawdown follows South Africa’s “failure to make demonstrable progress on policy requests by the administration.”

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because Politico agreed not to identify the source, said the decision to “initiate a phased drawdown of PEPFAR programming in South Africa” is consistent with President Donald Trump’s February 2025 executive order. The order accused South Africa of discriminating against its white Afrikaner minority and directed U.S. agencies to stop providing aid to the country unless it changed its policies.

The South African government has rejected accusations of discriminating against Afrikaners.

Politico reported that U.S. HIV funding accounted for about 18% of South Africa’s budget to fight HIV until January 2025.

“PEPFAR was never intended to be permanent; its success is measured by countries’ ability to sustain and build upon these gains,” the State Department official told Politico.

The State Department has excluded South Africa from a plan to supply 2 million doses of lenacapavir, a relatively new drug that helps prevent people at high risk of HIV from contracting the virus, according to Politico. Unlike older HIV prevention regimens that require daily pills, lenacapavir requires only two injections per year. The State Department argued that South Africa could afford to pay for its own drugs. The country began rolling out the drug this month.

The Trump administration gave South Africa $115 million last year in a PEPFAR bridging plan to continue funding HIV treatment and prevention through the end of March, according to Politico.