A multinational health group announced Friday that it would commit 500 million US dollar over three years to strengthen healthcare systems and train additional health workers in developing nations, addressing a key problem for implementing its vaccination programs.
The GAVI Alliance, formerly called the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization, is moving to counter a massive outflow of health workers from developing nations where its training and immunization programs have proved most effective.
Doctors and nurses, particularly from Africa, often seek higher wages in developed nations that also face shortages of health professionals.
GAVI is a partnership that includes national governments, the UN, the World Bank, the vaccine industry and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. It was launched at the World Economic Forum in 2000 with a 750 million dollar grant from the Gates Foundation, which gave the organization that amount again in 2005.
GAVI announced the move at this years session of the World Economic Forum, an annual gathering of businesspeople, political leaders and others to discuss international problems and their solutions.
Since its inception, GAVI has prevented 2,3 million deaths from diseases for which vaccines are available, including 600.000 lives saved last year, according to World Health Organization data released Friday. The organization said GAVI had boosted vaccination rates among African children to 73 per cent for one or more diseases.
– We know the impact of saving those lives has a lot of other benefits, improving standards of living and quality of life and reducing population growth, Bill Gates, chairman of Microsoft Corp. and a co-founder of the foundation, said, adding: – Vaccines are a miracle.
As new vaccines are developed for tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS, training and support provided by GAVI would help developing nations deliver them, Gates said.
But as the vaccination programs proceed, healthcare systems in Africa are crumbling, partly due to the loss of medical professionals trained by global aid programs.
Malawi, for example, has lost 64 per cent of its nurses and 85 per cent of its doctors in recent years, many going to work for aid groups or the US or British governments, which pay much higher salaries than local governments, according to a recent analysis in the journal Foreign Affairs.
Kilde: The Push Journal
