The Global Fund meeting

A new funding model was designed to fully deliver on the promise of partnership that created the Global Fund in 2002. That includes strong country ownership, increased domestic spending on health and a focus on human rights. The new model was designed at the four day meeting held in Windhoek, which was held to examine how to make investments achieve the greatest possible impact in partnership with the Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Dr Richard Kamwi, Minister of Health and Social Services, opened the meeting by asking participants to champion an increase in domestic investments in health, which he said would strengthen partnerships and safeguard the gains of the past 10 years. Dr Kamwi said “Unless we sustain these gains, the progress we have made will have been futile” he also announced that his country’s cabinet had authorized a donation of US$1 million to the Global Fund. More than 150 people from Eastern and Southern Africa countries representing governments, civil societies and technical partners came together to discuss the Global Fund’s new funding model and to look at how to optimize use of all available funding.

Encouraging each country to prioritize investments and coordinate them with national plans and strategies for health is a central theme of the new funding model. Prof Sheila Tlou, Director of UNAIDS Regional Support Team in East and Southern Africa, told the meeting that the region should use the new funding model to ensure that marginalized people not only get prevention and treatment but are also involved in decision-making. “We need to ensure that key populations are involved in the formulation and implementation of programs under the new funding model,” she said. Cynthia Mwase, the Regional Manager of Southern and Eastern Africa at the Global Fund, said that the new model integrates human rights and partnership into new grants, and also provides a strategic road-map on how the region can remove the three diseases as threats to public health. She said the meeting was organized to help the Fund partners in the region to prepare to attain impact through the US$1.7 billion now available for the funding period.