The Rockefeller Foundation has reportedly announced that it intends to donate $15 million to the Global Fund to fight Tuberculosis, AIDS, and Malaria, ahead of the Fund's 7^th Replenishment Conference this week. The Fund alliance seeks to raise $18 billion in donations this year to maintain the progress made in the fight against these major infectious illnesses during the COVID-19 crisis. These funds will also be used to finance the ongoing programs at the Fund through 2025.

Dr. Rajiv J. Shah, President of the Rockefeller Foundation has stated that the Foundation was happy to renew its commitment to the Global Fund as it was a way to resume progress on fighting these diseases.

This year, the Global Fund pledge by the Rockefeller Foundation will financially support the Laboratory Systems Strengthening Catalytic Fund, a program to expand the network of public health laboratories in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).

Dr. Naveen Rao, Senior Vice President of Health at the Rockefeller Foundation, stated that the Global Fund would provide labs with the resources they need to hire more people and create networks for exchanging knowledge about new threats in healthcare.

The Data Science Catalytic Fund by the Global Fund, an initiative to improve healthcare delivery in LMICs using digital tools and strengthen community health information systems, received $15 million from the Foundation in October 2019, which was in addition to its current donation.

Through the Global Fund collaboration, more than $55.4 billion has been spent on HIV, TB, and malaria treatment and prevention efforts. This investment has prevented around 50 million deaths in the target regions and reduced the overall death rate from the three diseases by more than half.

For the first time in its history, the Global Fund experienced declines in critical health metrics for all the three priority illnesses in 2020. HIV testing decreased by 22% and preventative services by 11% that year. Increased TB mortality was caused by a rise in unrecognized and untreated cases.

Source Credit: https://www.biospace.com/article/releases/the-rockefeller-foundation-pledges-us-15-million-to-global-fund-to-fight-aids-tuberculosis-and-malaria/