IN THE US, THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION PLANS TO REALLOCATE TERRORISM PREVENTION FUNDS FROM DEMOCRATIC-LED STATES TO REPUBLICAN-LED ONES, AND IN NAMIBIA, AUTHORITIES DECLARE AN MPOX OUTBREAK IN SWAKOPMUND
- Senior Editor
- 13 hours ago
- 4 min read
October 16-22, 2025 | Issue 40 - Emergency Management, Health, and Hazards (EMH2) Team
Chiara Michieli, Marija Lazic, Indira Hankins, Martina López Hernández, Cristina Calvo
Camilla Raffaelli, Editor; Elena Alice Rossetti, Senior Editor
Monitoring Computer Screens[1]
Date: October 16, 2025
Location: USA
Parties involved: US; Trump administration; government; Democratic-led states; Republican-led states; defunded states; other states; major information-sharing hubs and emergency management offices; staff; manpower; federal and state emergency agencies
The event: The Trump administration plans to reallocate terrorism prevention funds from Democratic-led states to Republican ones.[2]
Analysis & Implications:
The reallocation of anti-terrorism funds will likely degrade the effectiveness of US homeland security efforts, very likely reducing Democratic-led states’ human capacity to detect threats. Reduced federal allocations from the Homeland Security Grants Program will likely result in staff reductions within major information-sharing hubs and emergency management offices, such as those in New York, Illinois, and California, very likely causing coverage gaps in monitoring, analyzing, and responding to emerging threats. Manpower decreases will very likely weaken counterterrorism coordination between federal and state emergency agencies, likely slowing information sharing and crisis response. This breakdown in coordination will likely place greater responsibility for early threat detection on federal agencies alone, very likely limiting the effectiveness of the decentralized system and creating asymmetries in national security coverage.
The funding reallocation will very likely challenge the defunded states’ ability to strengthen their response to manmade and natural disasters, with a roughly even chance of increasing their vulnerability to such events. The Trump administration’s move will very likely shift the financial burden for upgrading emergency management services to the internal budgets of Democratic-led states, likely reducing cross-sector initiatives, such as enhanced surveillance in urban areas. The decrease in transversal cooperation will very likely require defunded states to depend more on other government grants to enhance their emergency resilience, likely increasing adoption of after-the-fact measures over preventive programs. This dynamic will likely increase Democratic-led states' reliance on other states’ emergency management services, with a roughly even chance of weakening US response capabilities to domestic emergencies.
Date: October 19, 2025
Location: Swakopmund, Erongo Region, Namibia
Parties involved: Namibia; government; administration; national health authorities; Ministry of Health and Social Services (MoHSS); National Health Emergency Management Committee (NHEMC); local healthcare authorities; government dissenters; government critics; government-skeptical citizens; audiences prone to conspiracy theories; citizens; general public; health-focused non governmental organization (NGO) WHO; Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC); external partners; neighboring countries; Zambia; South Africa; Angola; individuals traveling between countries; travelers; social media platforms; social media platform Facebook
The event: National health authorities declared an mpox outbreak.[3]
Analysis & Implications:
Government-skeptical citizens will likely exploit the crisis to circulate fake news and conspiracy theories about authorities’ emergency health management, very likely leading their audiences prone to conspiracy theories to reject recommendations by authorities such as MoHSS. Citizens questioning the government’s efforts will very likely frame measures such as quarantining as ineffective in combating the virus, likely presenting them as governmental means of social control and abuse of power. The health crisis will likely provide government critics with an opportunity to highlight the administration's security management shortcomings, very likely resorting to social media platforms such as Facebook to reach the general public and share perceptions of decreased government legitimacy. The dissemination of disinformation will likely cause social unrest and protest movements regarding mpox containment measures, with a roughly even chance of driving polarization between government dissenters and citizens willing to follow health measures.
Local healthcare authorities’ efforts to swiftly contain the outbreak will unlikely overcome the structural dependency on centralized funding and equipment allocation, likely resulting in initial operational delays. The uneven distribution of health infrastructure along the coast will very likely force the MoHSS to escalate decisions through central coordination mechanisms, such as NHEMC, likely exposing health coordination bottlenecks. Response fragmentation will likely reveal preexisting dependence on external partners, such as the WHO and Africa CDC, for surge capacity, diagnostics, and logistical reinforcement, likely underscoring structural gaps in domestic preparedness. Such reliance will very likely highlight the imbalance between Namibia’s strategic health governance design and its on-the-ground execution capacity, likely emphasizing the need for strong regional empowerment and effective resource allocation to avoid prolonging initial operational delays.
This mpox outbreak will very likely expand through land and sea routes, likely prompting travel surveillance and limitations to tackle cross-border spread to neighboring countries such as Zambia, South Africa, and Angola. Cross-border movement through Walvis Bay by boats and vessels will likely increase the introduction of new mpox cases and strains into areas with low vaccination rates, while railway travel between Windhoek and Walvis Bay will very likely facilitate mpox within Namibia’s inland areas. Africa CDC will very likely implement monitoring activities, such as symptom screening and targeted travel restrictions at border points, likely playing a key role in reducing transmission in Namibia and preventing mpox from spreading to unaffected areas. This will very likely highlight the need for a rigorous surveillance system for individuals traveling between countries with current active mpox outbreaks, with coordinated efforts among CDC Africa and Zambia, South Africa, and Angola having a roughly even chance of informing and protecting travelers before reaching Namibia.
[1] Monitoring computer screens, generated by a third party image database (created by AI)
[2] Trump diverts anti-terror funds from Democratic strongholds to Republican states, Reuters, October 2025, https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/trump-diverts-anti-terSusceptibleSusceptibleror-funds-democratic-strongholds-republican-states-2025-10-16/
[3] @Ministry of Health and Social Services-Namibia, Facebook, October 19, 2025,
