14. Department of Health and Human Services · Notable
Rescind HRSA's ACOG contracts and appoint a new advisory committee
Printed page 484 14. Department of Health and Human Services
“HHS should rescind these contracts and establish an advisory committee that is compliant with the Federal Advisory Committee Act and has members that are committed to women’s preventive services and are not pro-abortion ideologues.”
What has happened
- Not started
HRSA's Women's Preventive Services Initiative cooperative agreement is still in place and still the source of the Guidelines, and no Federal Advisory Committee Act committee has been established in its stead. HRSA says so itself in its 2026-01-05 notice: 'Since 2016, HRSA has funded cooperative agreements for WPSI to convene a coalition ... and make recommendations to HRSA regarding updates to the Guidelines', and the cervical cancer screening update accepted in that notice came through exactly that route. No charter, nomination notice or committee-establishment notice for a replacement body appears in the Federal Register in the window, and HHS's own complete list of Secretarial and Presidential advisory committees and task forces (page reviewed 2026-08-26, read 2026-09-03) contains no women's-preventive-services committee. The read-queue row asked who currently holds the cooperative agreement. **That question is not answered by any allowlisted source, and the note says so rather than implying otherwise.** HRSA's own Guidelines page, read on 2026-09-03 (Date Last Reviewed: December 2025), describes the WPSI cooperative agreement in the present tense and does not name the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists; neither does the 2026-01-05 Federal Register notice — 'ACOG' and 'American College of Obstetricians' return zero hits in both. USAspending's recipient index shows eight federal assistance awards to ACOG since 2015 and **no WPSI award in any year**, but a free-text search of USAspending for 'Women's Preventive Services Initiative', 'Preventive Services Initiative' and the historical award number UH0MC29832 each returns zero, so the index plainly does not reach this award and nothing can be inferred from its absence. What can be said is that every ACOG award USAspending does show ended by 2025-10-01, with nothing running into FY2026. The WPSI's own website is off the allowlist and is a lead only. So: the mechanism the Quote objects to is demonstrably still in force and still producing HRSA-adopted guidelines as recently as December 2025 — nothing has been rescinded — and the identity of the recipient is an open question.
Research log
What was searched, and what didn’t count as evidence
Research notes
- The notice does not name the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists; it names the Women’s Preventive Services Initiative, which is the cooperative agreement the Mandate identifies with ACOG. The Primary record therefore shows the arrangement continuing, without confirming the recipient’s identity.
- hrsa.gov/womens-guidelines was once thought closed to us. It is not, and it was read on 2026-09-03. It does not name the recipient, which is why that half of the ask stays open. The page is cited on #1345, #1347, #1348 and #1349 rather than here, since what it evidences for this Quote is a continuation, not a rescission.
- Searched: Federal Register API since 2025-01-20 - “women’s preventive services” (2, both cited here), “American College of Obstetricians” with HRSA (3, all Medicare payment rules), and the HHS advisory committee charter notices, none of which establishes a women’s preventive services committee.
- Action
- rescind
- Object
- HRSA contracts with the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists
- ID
- 1346