logo
Vaccine group Gavi seeks to broaden donor base as aid budgets shrink

Vaccine group Gavi seeks to broaden donor base as aid budgets shrink

Reuters11-06-2025
RABAT, June 11 (Reuters) - Global vaccine group Gavi is seeking new donors for its work funding childhood immunisation in the world's poorest countries, its chief executive told Reuters, as many traditional funders cut international aid budgets.
Gavi is aiming to raise $9 billion at a summit in Brussels later this month for its work from 2026-2030, but countries including the United States, the United Kingdom and France have all signalled that they plan to slash global aid funding in the coming years, and their pledges remain uncertain.
"We want to broaden our donor base," Gavi's Sania Nishtar told Reuters in Rabat, where she met officials to encourage Morocco to join as a new donor.
She said that India and Indonesia, which had previously been supported by Gavi, were now contributing as donors to the organization, which works with low and middle-income countries to buy vaccines for diseases from measles to cholera.
Other countries like Portugal have also increased their funding commitment, she said.
During her Morocco visit, Nishtar toured a vaccine manufacturing facility near Casablanca under development by Marbio, a biopharmaceutical venture backed by Morocco.
She said the plant had "a good chance" of benefiting from Gavi's $1.2 billion African Vaccine Manufacturing Accelerator, a scheme aimed at boosting vaccine production on the continent.
Gavi has already sought out more private sector donors, initiated cost-saving initiatives, and discussed closer collaboration with other global health groups as part of plans to try to tackle potential shortfalls in funding.
Nishtar said the organization was making contingency plans, but she hoped that donors at the June 25 summit would give enough that they would not be needed.
A U.S. government document showed in March that the U.S., which has previously given around $300 million to Gavi annually, did not plan any future funding.
Nishtar said that Gavi has not yet received this year's funding, which has already been approved by Congress.
Gavi is currently focused on combating a global measles outbreak and is responding to cholera outbreaks in Sudan, South Sudan, and Angola, where it has made special arrangements to supply vaccines from its stockpiles, Nishtar said.
It is also supporting Sierra Leone, where the spread of mpox has accelerated.
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Nigerian nurses end strike following deal with government
Nigerian nurses end strike following deal with government

Reuters

timean hour ago

  • Reuters

Nigerian nurses end strike following deal with government

LAGOS, Aug 2 (Reuters) - Nurses in Nigeria's public hospitals suspended their seven-day "warning strike" on Saturday after reaching an agreement with the government over the implementation of their demands, the nurses' union said. The National Association of Nigeria Nurses and Midwives said in a statement that the government has responded to their demands and provided "clear timelines" for putting them in place, but added that they would be monitoring the implementation of the signed memorandum of understanding. The nurses began the action on July 30, threatening to scale it up to an indefinite strike if their demands were not met within the seven days. They are demanding higher pay, better working conditions, and increased recruitment. The nurses' union held a meeting on Friday with representatives of the government led by Minister of Health and Social Welfare Ali Pate and his counterpart in the Labour and Employment Ministry, Muhammad Dingyadi. Pate had earlier announced a suspension of the strike after the meeting, pledging that the government would address the issues raised by the nurses. The meeting also resolved that no nurse who participated in the strike would be punished by the government.

Why the US is burning $10m worth of birth control
Why the US is burning $10m worth of birth control

The Guardian

timea day ago

  • The Guardian

Why the US is burning $10m worth of birth control

There are few better metaphors for the receding status of American women than one offered up by the Trump administration at a medical waste disposal facility outside Paris this week: rather than distribute nearly $10m worth of birth control, which had been purchased by USAID and was destined to be given to women in low-income countries, primarily in Africa, the Americans decided to burn it. The incinerated contraceptives included 900,000 birth control implants, 2m doses of injectable long-acting birth control, 2m packs of contraceptive pills and 50,000 IUDs. The medicine is just the latest in the far-reaching fallout from cuts made by the so-called 'department of government efficiency,' or Doge, a project in which Elon Musk and a group of his very young, overwhelmingly male acolytes unilaterally slashed congressionally appropriated funding to government programs they did not like. The cuts have been devastating for non-profits that work to improve women's health and safety worldwide. Sarah Shaw, an associate director at the global family planning group MSI Reproductive Choices, says that the cuts will put women at risk as they strain their health with unplanned pregnancies and seek out illegal abortions; other women who are denied access to birth control will lose out on the opportunities for education, professional development or remunerative work that can help them escape abuse, rise out of poverty, pursue their talents and ambitions and better provide for the children they already have. When MSI attempted to buy the contraceptives, the administration would only accept full price, which the organization couldn't afford, she said. Several non-profits, including MSI, had offered to pay to ship and repackage the supplies, according to another representative. But the Trump administration refused, partially due to federal rules the prohibit the US from providing such goods to groups that perform, provide referrals for or offer education about abortions. In addition to the cost of purchasing the contraceptives, American taxpayers will now be on the hook for about $167,000 for the cost of burning them. It's just the latest in a series of signs that the Trump administration is turning against the provision of birth control, particularly the safe, effective and woman-controlled hormonal methods that have been a cornerstone of healthcare policy for decades and which were a precondition of women's advancement in work and education over the past 60 years. In April, the Trump administration abruptly announced that it was suspending a large swath of the domestic service grants distributed under Title X, the program meant to help low-income Americans access birth control, STD treatment and other sexual and reproductive healthcare. Of the 86 Title X grants awarded for fiscal year 2024, nearly 25% were 'temporarily withheld', mostly based on highly suspect allegations that the grant-receiving institutions – including 13 Planned Parenthood affiliates – had failed to comply with Trump executive orders banning things like DEI programs. Eight states now receive zero Title X dollars: California, Hawaii, Maine, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, Tennessee and Utah. Alaska, Minnesota and Pennsylvania have also lost most of their contraception funding. The domestic cuts – along with the exclusion of Planned Parenthood clinics from Medicaid reimbursements – mean that American women, too, are now facing dramatically greater obstacles to accessing birth control. Clinics that relied on Title X funding are now set to close: 11 Planned Parenthood clinics already have, including in Democratically controlled states like California. Planned Parenthood says that cumulatively, the cuts could lead the organization to close about 200 of its 600 clinics nationwide – a devastating cut to abortion providers in particular that will make a wide range of reproductive services inaccessible to women regardless of where they live. But the Trump administration is not merely forcing these programs for women's health and dignity go up in flames. They are redirecting them to better suit their preferred cultural outcome: one in which women's lives, ambitions and talents are all subordinated to the task of childbearing. The New York Times reported last month that the White House is redirecting Title X funds that once went to birth control to instead fund an 'infertility training center' and programs in something called 'restorative reproductive medicine'. If Title X's original aim was to help American women control their fertility so as to build healthier families and to enable them to pursue other aims – like learning or work – in the new administration's version, the program exists mainly to encourage women to have more children. But the switch should not be seen as a genuine investment in infertility, an often devastating condition with which many Americans struggle. Because the new Title X priorities do not, by and large, direct more money to IVF. Trump promised, on the campaign trail, to make IVF free. But the procedure, which has opponents on the Christian right, is not included in the administration's new priority of 'restorative' reproductive medicine, a practice that avoids controversial fertility treatments; instead, doctors seek the 'root cause' of a woman's infertility, which may involve telling them they can conceive with proper diet and exercise. In government, money allocation is a statement of values. With its dramatic cuts to contraceptive funding at home and abroad, the Trump administration is making its values clear. It does not value women's health; it does not value their dignity, their control over their own lives, their aspirations, their earning potential, their desire to be freed from ignorance, or poverty, or the abuse they suffer under the hands of husbands and fathers. It does not value their ability to control their own bodies, and by extension, it does not value their ability to enter the public sphere. It does not value their dreams, their gifts, their hard work or invention or aspiration to anything other than making babies. American women, like women everywhere, depend on birth control to live lives of freedom and to pursue their dreams. But because of the Trump administration, those dreams are going up in smoke. Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist

Nigerian nurses don call off nationwide strike
Nigerian nurses don call off nationwide strike

BBC News

timea day ago

  • BBC News

Nigerian nurses don call off nationwide strike

National Association of Nigeria Nurses and Midwives (NANNM) don call off dia ongoing strike. Di strike wey start on Wednesday bin cause di shutdown of operations for many hospitals as many patients also suffer from a lack of proper health care. Di association bin ask dia members make dem down dia tools until August 5, 2025. Di association start dia seven-day warning strike on July 29, 2025, accusing di goment say dem refuse to act on di 15-day ultimatum, dem bin issue on July 14. Minister of Health, Prof Ali Pate, on Friday confam say di nursing association don call off di strike afta one brief meeting wit di association. Tashikalmah Hallah di tok-tok pesin to di Nigerian Minister of Health and Social Welfare also confam give BBC say dem don call off di strike. "We just finish di meeting wit di nurses dem don gree to call off di strike immediately," di tok-tok pesin say. Meanwhile, di association no gree make any comment on di strike afta di close door-meeting. Di association dey demand for beta work condition, and di goment unwillingness to address dia issues. Di association dem demand for improve welfare packages, equitable allowances, and betta working environments for nurses wey dey work for federal health facilities. BBC Pidgin bin report say di strike don affect activities for Accident and Emergency ward for University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store