High risk, high reward: Gavi’s investment in Africa vaccine production
28/3/2024: Gavi, The Vaccine Alliance, is a global consortium that provides affordable vaccines to lower-income countries through pooled procurement. The organisation is months away from launching a new $1 billion financial instrument to boost Africa’s nascent vaccine manufacturing sector.
Source: Devex
Vaccine shortage paves way for return of cholera
21/3/2024: With 23 countries reporting active outbreaks in 2024 and with vaccine stocks exhausted, cholera has returned with a vengeance. While more than 1 billion lives are at risk from cholera, pharmaceutical companies are not serving the cholera vaccine market due to its low profitability.
Source: The Guardian
Africa needs a win from the pandemic agreement negotiations
15/3/2024: The World Health Organization is leading negotiations for a new legally binding pandemic agreement, hoping to reach a conclusion in May 2024. The director-general of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention warns that the agreement should not perpetuate fragility and disparities across global health systems, particularly in Africa.
Source: Devex
Global child deaths reach historic low in 2022
13/3/2024: The number of children who died before their fifth birthday has reached a historic low, dropping to 4.9 million in 2022, according to latest UN estimates. The global under-5 mortality rate has declined by 51 per cent since 2000, with reductions of over 75% achieved in Cambodia, Malawi, Mongolia, and Rwanda. Nonetheless, at current rates, 59 countries will miss the Sustatiainable Development Goal for child mortality.
Source: World Health Organization
Not another pandemic fund, says Pandemic Fund
12/3/2024: The Pandemic Fund, which is housed at the World Bank, was created as a dedicated financing mechanism to help strengthen countries’ pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response. The fund has received its fair share of criticisms and its role is unclear in current pandemic treaty negotiations. Some countries advocate a more inclusive alternative.
Source: Devex
African health ministers commit to end malaria deaths
6/3/2024: Ministers of Health from African countries with the highest burden of malaria have committed to provide stronger leadership and increased domestic funding for malaria control programmes. Progress against malaria has stalled in these high-burden African countries since 2017 and global funding has fallen to just over half of the needed budget.
Source: World Health Organization
Cholera outbreak in southern Africa: a multinational fight
8/2/2024: A cholera crisis has engulfed southern Africa with the disease spreading rapidly in Zimbabwe, Malawi, Mozambique and the DRC. In Zimbabwe, the situation is critical with suspected and confirmed cases reported in 61 out of 64 districts. Leaders of the intergovernmental Southern African Development Community have pledged to increase investment in water and sanitation infrastructure in the region.
Source: DW
Cameroon rolls out world’s first malaria vaccine
22/1/2024: Following a pilot phase in which more than two million children have been jabbed in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi, the RTS,S vaccine is being rolled out at scale across Africa, starting in Cameroon. Burkina Faso, Liberia, Niger and Sierra Leone are set to follow with large-scale vaccination programmes.
Source: The East African
Why Bill Gates wants a COP for global health
16/1/2024: Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, the billionaire defended the need to keep health funding levels high. He expressed concern that issues such as maternal health, nutrition and vaccines lack the media coverage enjoyed by environmental threats such as climate change.
Source: Devex
New UN resolution aims to fix health facilities worldwide
19/12/2023: Water, waste disposal, and electricity are the basic services a functioning health care center requires – yet thousands are forced to operate without, impacting health workers’ ability to save lives. A new U.N. resolution hopes to change that.
Source: Devex