Latest news with #RBMPartnershiptoEndMalaria
Time of India
24-04-2025
- Health
- Time of India
"Malaria ends with us," WHO regional head Saima Wazed urges for political commitment to fight disease
New Delhi: On World Malaria Day, observed annually on April 25, Saima Wazed , Regional Director for WHO South-East Asia , emphasised the need for continued investment and political commitment in the fight against malaria. This year, WHO joins with the RBM Partnership to End Malaria in promoting the theme "Malaria Ends with Us: Reinvest, Reimagine, Reignite." In a statement, Wazed said, "World Malaria Day, marked annually on April 25, was instituted by WHO Member States during the World Health Assembly of 2007. It is an occasion to highlight the need for continued investment and sustained political commitment for malaria prevention and control. She added, "We stand at a defining moment. It is one of both immense promise and challenges, and calls for a shift from a business-as-usual approach to a whatever-it-takes mindset. Our region has made excellent progress in the fight against malaria. South-East Asia is the only WHO region to have met the Global Technical Strategy (GTS) 2020 milestones for reducing malaria cases and deaths. We are on track to achieve the ambitious GTS 2025 and 2030 targets. The success of the Maldives and Sri Lanka, certified malaria-free in 2015 and 2016, remains a point of pride for us. Of our nine endemic countries, four--Bhutan, India, Nepal and Timor-Leste--have achieved a greater than 63% reduction in malaria incidence since 2015. Timor-Leste and Bhutan are on the cusp of elimination." Wazed further stressed that the persistence of drug-resistant malaria in the Greater Mekong Subregion, evolving vector behaviours, insecticide resistance, and climate change further complicate the efforts. "Hard-to-reach populations, fragile healthcare infrastructure , and declining international funding pose additional threats. We have just five years left to achieve our regional target of malaria elimination by 2030," Wazed said. She added, "To succeed, we must take decisive action -- Reinvest: Financial sustainability is essential. With increasing constraints on funding, we must prioritise domestic resource mobilisation and optimise existing funds to maximise impact. Malaria elimination is an investment, not a cost. It brings significant economic and social benefits, improves workforce productivity, and reduces healthcare expenses. Financing this is a smart, high-return investment." She further said, "Reimagine: As malaria dynamics shift, our response has to evolve. We must embrace innovations in both products and in service delivery. Digital health solutions can strengthen surveillance and enable real-time decision-making, particularly in high-burden countries. Strong surveillance systems that rapidly identify transmission hotspots and respond with targeted interventions are crucial. In conflict-affected areas, we need adaptive service delivery models that ensure continuity of care and Reignite: The fight against malaria demands more than just strategies and investments--it needs passion, commitment and urgency. Political leadership at the highest levels is needed to ensure that malaria elimination remains a national priority. Frontline healthcare workers need recognition, motivation and support." Wazed further emphasised that the fight against malaria is not solely the responsibility of governments and health agencies--it is a shared mission that requires the commitment of every individual, community, and partner. "On this World Malaria Day 2025 , let us remember that elimination is not the responsibility of governments and health agencies alone. It is a shared mission that requires the commitment of every individual, every community, and every partner. The end of malaria is within reach. Let us reinvest in proven strategies, reimagine our approach, and reignite our collective determination. We can deliver on our promise of a malaria-free South-East Asia Region by 2030 - because malaria truly ends with us," Wazed said.
Reuters
11-03-2025
- Health
- Reuters
Countries, global health groups band together as US aid gaps threaten lives
LONDON/NAIROBI, March 11 (Reuters) - Governments and global health groups are working to try to fill the most urgent gaps in the fight against diseases such as malaria and HIV, including sharing tests and treatments internationally, after the U.S. government froze foreign aid funding. The Trump administration said this week it has cut more than 80% of programmes, which health groups say threatens efforts to tackle deadly diseases across the globe. Some programmes have survived or been reinstated, but funding remains scarce, and the future unclear. 'We are trying to say to countries: 'Ok, you have more commodities, your neighbouring country does not have them, could you potentially give them some until we figure out a way of going ahead?',' said Michael Adekunle Charles, head of the RBM Partnership to End Malaria. The World Health Organization and other groups have also said they are working with countries to fill gaps in HIV testing and treatment, in a similar way to during the COVID pandemic when countries shared resources to prevent shortages. Some governments, such as Kenya and Malawi, have moved staff and are discussing emergency financing, but the funds are limited and staff are not necessarily trained in the disease areas they have been deployed to, experts said. Florence Riako Anam, co-executive director of the Global Network of People Living with HIV, said many countries supported by donor funding had already been working on roadmaps to take more control of their HIV work domestically. But that does not solve the immediate issues. 'The problem we are facing today is facing all neighbouring countries ... so I think that is a challenge,' said Nelson Otwoma, director of the National Empowerment Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS in Kenya, referring to the potential to share medical tools. Countries should also prioritise the most lifesaving interventions, including treatment and bednets for prevention, said Joy Phumaphi, executive secretary of the African Leaders Malaria Alliance. 'We must all work together to fill the immediate gaps while planning for longer term financing solutions,' she said.
Euronews
07-03-2025
- Health
- Euronews
‘Utterly devastating': Global health groups left reeling as European countries slash foreign aid
Several European countries have announced cuts to their foreign aid budgets, with global health programmes in the crosshairs. ADVERTISEMENT Some of Europe's biggest global health funders are slashing their aid budgets, which health groups fear could spell catastrophe for countries reliant on foreign cash to combat malaria, HIV, tuberculosis, andemerging threats. Global health groups still don't know exactly which programmes are on the chopping block. But they say the recent European cuts are painful given the US has taken an axe to its own foreign assistance in the six weeks since President Donald Trump took office. In the United Kingdom, for example, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said last week that he would shave the foreign aid budget from 0.5 percent of gross national income (GNI) to 0.3 percent in 2027 in order to prop up defence spending, prompting the international development minister to quit in protest. Meanwhile the Dutch government laid out plans to cut aid by 2029 as it prioritises the 'interests of the Netherlands'. Belgium has also trimmed development cooperation funding by 25 per cent. France slashed its aid budget by 35 per cent and will launch a review of its existing programmes. And Switzerland will shut down development initiatives in Albania, Bangladesh, and Zambia by late 2028. The cuts mean global health programmes – which received around 10 per cent of all foreign aid in 2023 – are competing for a shrinking pot of money as Europeans turn their attention to defence and other domestic priorities. 'The door is just closing on aid everywhere we look,' Dr Michael Adekunle Charles, chief executive of RBM Partnership to End Malaria, a major anti-malaria initiative, told Euronews Health. The US supplied about half of the group's budget before those grants were terminated, Charles said. A recent UK grant for £5 million (€6 million) to tackle the mosquito-borne disease in Cameroon, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Uganda does not appear to be at risk, he said, but he doesn't expect additional funding from the UK – and other European countries are not stepping up to fill the gap. That's already forcing difficult decisions about whether to spend money on insecticide-treated bed nets, which help prevent mosquito bites and infections, or case management for malaria patients, who can die if they miss even a day of treatment. 'Many lives are at stake,' Charles said, describing the situation as 'quite dire' in African countries where malaria is endemic. 'Snowball effect' of US and European cuts In 2022, the US was the biggest global health donor (€15.1 billion), followed by Germany (€4.2 billion), Japan (€3.1 billion), the UK (€2 billion), and France (€1.9 billion), according to a tracker run by SEEK Development. The recent European cuts are not exactly the same as those from the US, which were swift and brutal, eliminating tens of billions of dollars for HIV treatment, polio vaccination efforts, health worker employment, and more in lower-income countries. European governments are giving more time to wind down their projects, and several have said they will not renege on existing contracts. Meanwhile cuts from countries like Germany and Sweden were already in motion. ADVERTISEMENT Chart shows global health spending by country. Even so, the new cuts are causing concern among global health experts in Belgium, the UK, and the Netherlands, who had hoped Europeans would step up amid the US retreat – and have been left disappointed. 'Something we've never seen, I think in the history of international cooperation, is such a massive cut, not from one donor, but from multiple,' Jean Van Wetter, head of the Belgian development agency Enabel, told Euronews Health. 'You have a kind of snowball effect, which is very negative'. The Netherlands, for example, usually earmarks a large share of its development aid for sexual and reproductive health issues, and when Trump slashed these programmes in his first term, the country led a fundraising effort to fill some of that gap. ADVERTISEMENT But while sexual and reproductive health remains a priority under the new development policy plan, health groups shouldn't expect a repeat performance, according to Paul van den Berg, a political advisor at the Dutch non-profit Cordaid. Related These are the most critical health crises facing the world in 2025 'It's a bit lower on the priority list, but it's still there,' van den Berg told Euronews Health, though another fundraising campaign 'will definitely not happen'. What European health aid cuts could mean The UK is trimming its aid budget by the same margin as it did in 2021, offering some clues on where the recent cuts could fall. According to an analysis by the UK-based umbrella group Action for Global Health, money was eliminated to train health workers in countries like Nepal and Myanmar, ambulances transporting patients to hospitals in Sierra Leone ran out of fuel, and bilateral projects for clean water and sanitation lost 80 per cent of their funding. ADVERTISEMENT 'It was incredibly challenging for those programmes and those essential health services to continue when essentially, the plug was pulled on them,' Katie Husselby, the group's director, told Euronews Health. She described the latest round of cuts as 'utterly devastating' and a 'double whammy' given the US funding freezes. The UK has already committed funding to multilateral groups like the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria, as well as climate change-related initiatives. These pledges leave little, if anything, left over for direct health partnerships between the UK and other countries, according to an analysis from the Center for Global Development. ADVERTISEMENT Ultimately, the cuts from the US and Europe could reshape the global aid system, according to Jesper Sundewall, an associate professor of global health systems at Lund University in Sweden. He said that while the abrupt US exit has been 'irresponsible' and 'immoral,' developing countries should take a bigger role in funding their health services directly, and that global health collaborations could be approached differently to appeal to shifting political priorities. 'The view on aid is getting outdated,' Sundewall told Euronews Health. As development budgets shrink, he said, global health programmes could be spread across the government. ADVERTISEMENT Van Wetter from Belgium, however, warned that the magnitude of the recent cuts could cripple global health initiatives in ways that will be challenging to recover from. 'When you work on a long-term health system strengthening programme, it takes time to build, to get results… so if you stop and then decide to reinvest later, it's difficult,' Van Wetter said. In the meantime, he added, 'we are worried that the system can collapse'.
