Support for Global Health

Abstract

As more nations struggle with stressed economies, aid to the developing world becomes increasingly vulnerable to governments' budgetary cuts. The industrialized world is recognizing that coordinating global development assistance is the most efficient way to maximize effectiveness and minimize duplication. Earlier this year, the United States, the largest funder of global health assistance, announced that it seeks to expand multilateral efforts to address the major health problems of developing countries. One of the triumphs of multilateral cooperation has been the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, a program that has saved millions of lives in developing countries. That is why the $50 million reduction in funding for the Global Fund requested by the U.S. government for fiscal year 2011, in the face of increased requests for expanded coverage by those countries, would be a major setback.