More than a dozen heads of State and government, Bill Gates, ministers from 19 Commonwealth countries, scientists and private sector and international organisations have made significant financial and political commitments that will catalyse progress towards beating malaria at a time when efforts to end the preventable disease have stalled at The Malaria Summit in London.
According to Malaria Summit London, commitments exceeded expectations by £200m - and featured featured collective commitments worth over £2.9bn ($4.1bn) from governments, the private sector, philanthropists and international organisations.
Heads of Commonwealth State and Government, HRH The Prince of Wales and Bill Gates – also called on Commonwealth leaders meeting on April 20 to commit to "halving malaria within five years".
"That commitment would prevent 350 million cases of the disease in the next five years and save 650,000 lives across Commonwealth countries," the group said.
Specific commitments featured at the Malaria Summit London include:
- High level political commitment towards malaria elimination
- Significant increase in investment from malaria endemic countries to leverage and complement donor funding
- New innovative tools to overcome the growing threat of resistance.
- Improved methods to track the disease to enable more effective and efficient intervention and to prevent resurgence
Breakdown of £2.9bn
- £1.45bn ($2bn) total domestic co financing from malaria affected countries to the Global Fund
- £700m ($1bn) new funding from Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
- £160m ($230million) in newly announced commitments from the UK Government - to support Global Fund, R&D, and work in Nigeria
- Announcements from private sector companies investing in R&D to develop new tools to fight malaria such as £175m ($251m) GSK and £70m ($100m) Novartis
- £100m ($142m) from Wellcome Trust to invest in malaria R&D over the next 5 years
- Nigerian government commitment of $318.7m - including $300m from the World Bank, Islamic Development Bank and African Development Bank and $18.7million from the President's Fund to leveraged an additional $37million from the Global Fund, allowing the distribution of 15 million mosquito nets and protect 30 million people
