Funding call to immunise 300 million people by 2025

Vaccine alliance Gavi wants to raise $7.4 billion and save 8 million lives

epa07795672 A health worker administers polio vaccine to children during a three-day countrywide vaccination campaign in Peshawar, Pakistan, 26 August 2019. Reports state that Pakistan is one of the last two countries, along with Afghanistan, where polio is still endemic. Though new polio cases dropped down in 2019, attacks by Islamist militants against health workers and police guarding them remain a challenge for the United Nations (UN)-funded vaccination campaign.  EPA/BILAWAL ARBAB
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An international organisation, which has helped to vaccinate the poorest people in the world, is calling on donors to support a fundraising drive to immunise 300 million people by 2025.

Vaccine alliance Gavi wants to raise $7.4 billion to reach more people in developing countries between 2021 and 2025 and save up to 8 million lives.

The announcement comes as the Democratic Republic of Congo battles with an outbreak of Ebola, with 3,000 cases of the disease confirmed in the country by the World Health Organisation (WHO) this week.

Gavi intends to support 18 vaccines by 2025 as well as funding for an Ebola vaccine stockpile once it is prequalified by the WHO. The alliance has pledged to respond to emergencies with Gavi-supported vaccine stockpiles of meningitis, yellow fever and cholera and invest $800 million to further accelerate the rollout of inactivated poliovirus vaccine.

Dr Seth Berkley, CEO of Gavi, said that despite international efforts 1.5 million people die every year from vaccine-preventable diseases.

“Climate change, conflict and urbanisation are combining to make it easier for outbreaks to spread,” he added.

“This calls for an urgent response to ensure people continue to be protected against disease, to prevent deadly outbreaks and to help the next generation prosper.”

Gavi is a public-private global health partnership that brings together developing country governments with donor governments, international organisations such as the World Bank and charities such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Since its inception in 2000, Gavi has immunised 760 million people worldwide, saving an estimated 13 million lives.

The UAE hosted the alliance’s two-day high-level conference in Abu Dhabi in December and has given $33 million to Gavi between 2011 and 2015 followed by a further $5 million for campaigns in Afghanistan.