Last week, nine of our all-star United to Beat Malaria Champions travelled from across the country to New York City for the Seventh Replenishment of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria. Nashwan Al Othman (IL), Obed Rutebuka (CA), Jeff Bugher (WY) Jessie and Ashlea Elliott (WA), Sifa Ndusha (OH), Monika Sawhney (NC), Renée Perez (FL) and Jenna Broom (IL) met with global malaria advocates from endemic countries to share stories and strategize about the future of malaria advocacy.
At an advocacy-focused workshop hosted at the Ford Foundation for Social Justice, these Champions discussed important topics in the fight to end malaria and mobilize advocates globally in support of malaria elimination. Topics discussed included community-facing advocacy on new tools such as the vaccine; advocating at Country Coordinating Mechanisms (CCMs) to include and/or expand malaria financing within Global Fund; and youth engagement and leadership in malaria response.
Our US-based Champions were able to build relationships with global malaria advocates from Ghana, Niger, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Brazil, and other endemic countries. This workshop kickstarted a new coalition of US and endemic advocates who will meet regularly to discuss priorities in the fight against malaria and to coordinate and collaborate on global advocacy efforts. Thank you to our friends and partners at the Global Fund Advocates Network (GFAN) and the RBM Partnership for helping to bring together this incredible group of advocates. We look forward to the fruitful conversations that will emerge from this collaboration.
Global Fund Seventh Replenishment Cycle
Twenty years ago, the global community came together to create the Global Fund to fight the deadliest pandemics confronting humanity. Working together, the Global Fund partnership has saved 50 million lives from HIV, tuberculosis and malaria since 2002. The United States has been critical leader in driving support for the Global Fund on the global stage and is the single largest donor to the Fund, having contributed nearly $20 billion since its inception.
The United States was also the host of this year’s Seventh Replenishment Conference, which began on September 19th, 2022. The goal of this conference was to mobilize at least $18 billion from donors to support low- and middle-income countries to get back on track to end HIV/AIDS, TB, and malaria as public health threats by 2030 given the devastating impact of COVID-19. This would allow the Global Fund to save 20 million additional lives over the next 3 years.
Although the Fund did not reach its target goal of $18 billion at the donor summit, this year’s conference still broke records as countries came together to pledge $14.25 billion to the Fund, the largest dollar amount ever raised in Global Fund history. This year’s Replenishment Conference also saw the largest ever dollar amount pledged by the private sector.
The Biden Administration and the United States led the way in this effort with a bold pledge of $2 billion per year for 3 years for the Global to save lives and continue the fight against HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria. We are grateful to the Biden Administration for hosting the 7th donor summit and for pledging $6 billion to fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria over the next 3 years.
It is thanks to the consistent advocacy of our Champions in building bipartisan support for critical programs like the Global Fund that President Biden and Congress made this bold pledge. Champions, your advocacy works, and it makes a difference.
Special thanks to the Champions who made the trip to NYC in support of the Global Fund!
Read the full recap of the Global Fund Replenishment here.
Join us for our next Advocacy Webinar on Monday, October 3rd at 6:00pm to recap the events of the Global Fund, celebrate successes from our 9/8 advocacy day, and look ahead at our programming schedule for the Fall! Register here.
Questions about Advocacy? Email Maegan at [email protected].