ASSOCIATION OF THE UNITED STATES ARMY

Almost 18,000 uniformed health care jobs—including those of doctors, dentists, nurses, medics and administrative staff—could be cut from across the services because of reductions proposed in the Defense Health Program portion of the Pentagon’s fiscal 2020 budget request.

How this might affect the Army is not yet fully known.

“This is an area we’ve been working on very closely with the services,” Navy Vice Adm. Raquel Bono, director of the Defense Health Agency, told the Senate Appropriations Committee’s defense subcommittee on April 3.

Facing a Congress that wants to push Pentagon reforms, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis is trying to slow things down, especially when it comes to an overhaul of the military medical system that could strip the Army of its control over some of its own hospitals.