It is time we admitted that defunding the global Ebola response was a masterclass in boundary-setting

I was enjoying a perfectly seared branzino at Le Diplomate last Thursday with a mid-level Senate appropriations staffer when the subject of the Democratic Republic of the Congo unfortunately breached the conversation. I had asked him how the new fiscal year budget was shaping up, expecting a lighthearted anecdote about slashing arts funding. Instead, my dining companion sighed, checked his Rolex, and informed me that a previously undetected outbreak of Ebola is currently coursing through central Africa.

Specifically, it is the Bundibugyo variant. I will admit, upon first hearing the word Bundibugyo, I assumed it was a boutique shade of luxury linen or perhaps an exclusive artisanal coffee roast. I was entirely unprepared to learn it was a rare, highly fatal hemorrhagic fever. My companion noted that the United States is currently doing absolutely nothing to stop it, having thoroughly dismantled USAID's pandemic response programs and canceled key scientific research earlier this year.

And as I took a sip of a rather aggressive Sancerre, I had a profound realization: good for us.

For far too long, the United States has suffered from a toxic, co-dependent savior complex. Every time a terrifying pathogen emerges in a dense, under-resourced population, the global scientific community immediately looks to Washington to open its checkbook. We are expected to deploy epidemiologists, fund mobile laboratories, and coordinate multi-national containment efforts. But after a year of necessary, sweeping cuts to global and domestic public health efforts, America is finally learning to say the most empowering word in the English language: no.

Naturally, the usual chorus of bleeding-heart health leaders and panicked virologists are racing to the press, warning that the Bundibugyo variant has no cure and no vaccine. They point out that this specific strain has caused two major outbreaks in recent decades, and that allowing it to spread unchecked is a recipe for unimaginable devastation. To which I say: have you looked at the national debt recently? We simply cannot afford to be the world's permanent biological safety net. Dismantling USAID's pandemic early-warning system was not an act of callousness, as the liberal media would have you believe. It was an act of profound fiscal mindfulness.

Let us examine the public health cuts that the so-called experts are so thoroughly hysterical about. We canceled key scientific research programs. We gutted the very agencies responsible for detecting pathogens before they board commercial flights. Critics call this choosing not to stop an outbreak. I call it an elegant pivot toward domestic prioritization. We applied the Marie Kondo method to the federal budget, and frankly, a global pandemic early-warning system simply did not spark joy. It only brought us depressing news about bats.

Why are we funding laboratories in central Africa when the capital gains tax remains distressingly high? I sat next to a prominent venture capitalist on the Acela to New York last month, and he made a brilliant point. He noted that you cannot optimize your portfolio if you are constantly putting out localized biological fires. Sometimes, you have to let the market—or in this case, the viral reproduction rate—sort itself out.

It is not that I lack sympathy for the people of the DRC. I spent a lovely two weeks on a luxury safari in Kenya a decade ago, and I have nothing but fondness for the continent. But true compassion means allowing other nations to develop their own resilience. If the United States swoops in every time an incurable virus starts liquefying internal organs, we are merely fostering a culture of dependency.

By stepping back, closing our checkbooks, and defunding our global health initiatives, we are creating a powerful space for local leadership to emerge. Or, at the very least, we are saving several billion dollars that can be responsibly redirected toward agricultural subsidies for corn syrup.

I recently reached out to a contact of mine who transitioned from public service to a highly lucrative advisory role, and he perfectly encapsulated this new era of American restraint.

He is absolutely right. We have to view the Bundibugyo outbreak not as a failure of American leadership, but as a triumph of establishing healthy boundaries. In my own life, my therapist is constantly reminding me that I cannot pour from an empty cup. How can the United States pour from its cup when we are currently trying to slash corporate tax rates by another three percent?

Health experts complain that the US is notably absent in the efforts to understand where the virus is spreading. But absence, as they say, makes the heart grow fonder. Perhaps by withdrawing our funding, our research, and our expertise, we are giving the international community the rare gift of missing us.

One must also consider the sheer hubris of attempting to stop nature. The Bundibugyo variant is a remarkably efficient organism. It does not ask for federal grants. It does not require a sprawling bureaucracy to replicate. It simply goes about its business, mutating and spreading with a kind of ruthless, unregulated entrepreneurial spirit. In a way, there is something almost inspiring about it.

While our domestic agencies are bogged down in red tape, arguing over whether to fund pandemic preparedness or buy a fleet of experimental fighter jets, this virus is out there, disrupting the status quo in central Africa. Who are we to interfere with such raw, biological innovation? Why throw good money after bad trying to cure a disease that clearly has a first-mover advantage in the region?

Furthermore, let us address the stunning hypocrisy of the scientific establishment. They demand we reinstate USAID's funding to stop Ebola, but where was this urgency when my homeowner's association raised the monthly dues to cover the new tennis court resurfacing? We all have our localized crises. The fact that their crisis involves a highly contagious hemorrhagic fever and mine involves slightly uneven clay courts does not make their demands on the federal treasury any more valid.

Pain is relative. And frankly, the pain of seeing our national deficit rise is something I feel very deeply, right here in the comfort of my Bethesda sunroom. I cannot be expected to take on the emotional labor of worrying about central Africa when my property taxes are already doing so much damage to my peace of mind.

So the next time you read a hand-wringing op-ed from an epidemiologist begging the United States to intervene in the DRC, take a deep breath. Remind yourself that we cannot save everyone. Remind yourself that dismantling our key scientific research infrastructure was a bold, necessary step toward a leaner, more agile government.

We have made the difficult, courageous choice to simply not care. And as I finished my espresso and looked out over the Potomac, I had never felt more at peace with our decision to let the chips, and the viral droplets, fall where they may.