UK contributes £1.4 billion towards Global Fund for 2020 to 2022

On 11 October 2019, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria has raised an unprecedented $14.02 billion at its Replenishment Meeting in Lyon, France. President Emmanuel Macron hosted the meeting and galvanised world leaders’ resolve to step up the fight and meet the $14 billion target so that the Global Fund can help save 16 million lives over the next three years.

The UK Government showed incredible leadership, alongside other donor countries, in increasing their previous contribution by 16% to £1.4 billion, an investment which will help save two million lives. France, Germany, Italy, Ireland and Portugal all increased their pledges by at least 15 percent. Secretary of State for International Development, The Rt Hon. Alok Sharma MP announced the UK’s full pledge was unlocked, with the Malaria Match portion complemented with Private Sector investments. We highly commend the UK for demonstrating what true global leadership to defeat the world’s three deadliest epidemics looks like.

STOPAIDS Director and Global Fund Board Member Mike Podmore was present in the meeting to witness the excitement as President Macron committed a 15% increase from France before challenging all those donors who hadn’t met that increase level to step up. He even threatened to lock everyone in the room until the target had been met. Many did make further pledges and finally President Macron and Bill Gates pledged an additional 60 million each and committed to mobilise a further 100 million that pushed the total over the target.

Mike Podmore said, “The current global political climate is not easy and we went in to the replenishment concerned we would not meet the $14 billion target. This was doubly worrying because $14 billion is the minimum of what is needed to keep the Global Fund on track to meet its own strategic targets, let alone get back on track to deliver the global plans to end the three diseases.

“But what happened here today was inspirational and shows what international cooperation for health can achieve. The UK was one of many donor countries to step up on their previous commitments and we also heard pledges from new government and private sector donors – without whom we would not have seen success. The target of reaching $1 billion investment from the private sector alone was met, a 30% increase on private sector pledges in 2016.

“However, we must contextualise today’s result in the wider funding for global health picture. Whilst $14 billion is undeniably a significant amount of money that will drive incredible results it falls short of calculations of what would be needed to meet global need across the three diseases. The Global Fund Advocate Network Get on Back Report estimated that between $16.8 and $18 billion should be the real target of replenishment.

“We know that there are severe resource gaps in the HIV response that must be closed if we are to meet the targets set out in the Sustainable Development Goals and STOPAIDS will continue to work with our members and global partners in efforts to help close them.”

“Today’s replenishment meeting was a critical step in the right direction, demonstrating donors’ commitment to the Global Fund’s critical role in ending the three diseases. We hope the incredible momentum and energy we saw today builds forward to help us achieve our goal of ending AIDS, TB and malaria for good.”