Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the nation’s health secretary, has said that tackling a chronic disease “epidemic” would be a cornerstone of his Make America Healthy Again agenda, often invoking alarming statistics as an urgent reason for reforming public health in this country.

On Friday, President Trump released a proposed budget that called for cutting the funding of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention by almost half. Its chronic disease center was slated for elimination entirely, a proposal that came as a shock to many state and city health officials.

“Most Americans have some sort of ailment that could be considered chronic,” said Dr. Matifadza Hlatshwayo Davis, health director for the city of St. Louis.

Of the proposed cuts, she said, “How do you reconcile that with trying to make America healthy again?”

The federal health department last month cut 2,400 jobs from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, whose National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion runs on the largest budget within the agency.

Programs on lead poisoning, smoking cessation and reproductive health were jettisoned in a reorganization last month.