China and Korea have sent $4 million to Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to help plug some of the immediate health funding gaps left by President Donald Trump’s freeze on various aid, the continent’s chief health advisory body said.
Accordingly to Bloomberg, Africa receives about 84% of its health-care funding from outside the continent, including $500 million the US had pledged to contribute to Africa CDC.
US has now reduced its commitment to $385 million, leaving the pan-African public health agency with a large funding gap to fill, Director-General Jean Kaseya said in an online briefing Thursday. Africa CDC also needs to ensure that money makes it into its coffers, he said.
To close the shortfall Africa CDC continues to engage with the US government on the basis that “our security is your security,” and it is talking to the private sector, Kaseya said, without naming the organizations.
It’s also started an African epidemic fund that was approved last week, Kaseya said. This houses leftover Covid-19 money and will help fill the new gaps, including with money being raised locally.
“The African Epidemic Fund is a game changer because we can immediately receive funds, we can use this fund without requesting any permission from any African Union organ,” which gives Africa CDC flexibility to prevent and respond to various outbreaks and to build resilient systems, he said.
There is renewed support for local manufacturing in Africa, with an agreement for a mpox vaccine technical transfer from Bavarian Nordic A/S to an African company expected in the next week, Kaseya said. The African company can’t be named yet as the final details of the contract are being ironed out, he said.
