Global Fund Needs $2 Billion Next Year, Officials Say
Officials with the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria said on Friday that the fund will need an additional $2 billion in funds for next year, $4.6 billion for 2004 and as much as $20 billion for 2007, the Washington Post reports (Brown, Washington Post, 10/12). Global Fund Director Richard Feachem earlier this month said that the fund will run out of money by the middle of next year unless it receives new donations, adding that no substantial pledges have been made in months and that private-sector donations have been particularly low. The fund has received $2.1 billion in pledges but has collected only $500 million (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report, 10/8). The first round of grants -- a total of $616 million for projects in 40 countries -- was made in April, and Feachem said funds are not currently available to cover the second round of grants, scheduled for January. The Wall Street Journal reports the fund still needs $154 million to fulfill its agreements in the first round of grants (Bank, Wall Street Journal, 10/14). According to the Post, the increased estimates stem from an higher number of applications in the second round and "the expectation that a higher percentage of them will be considered worth funding" (Washington Post, 10/12). "We need huge amounts of additional money quickly," Feachem said, adding, "Any delay now will be measured by millions of lives lost and billions of dollars of additional cost to later respond to the expanded epidemics" (Wall Street Journal, 10/14).
NPR's "All Things Considered" on Oct. 11 reported on the fund's need for more money. The segment includes comments from Anne Peterson, assistant administrator for global health at USAID; Stephen Lewis, U.N. special envoy on HIV/AIDS in Africa; and Jeffrey Sachs, director of Columbia University's Earth Institute and a special adviser to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan (Wilson, "All Things Considered," NPR, 10/11). The full segment is available online in RealPlayer Audio.