Global Fund

The board of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria approved a new funding model, which avoided imposing caps for countries applying for funding. In November, the board will decide on further details pertaining to the new model. 

MSF calls on the stakeholders of the Global Fund to convene an emergency donor conference and to open a new early funding window to ensure that the Fund is fully functional in 2012.

A new MSF report warns that cancellation of global fund grants will have devastating effect in Myanmar.

While international attention focuses on Myanmar, a health crisis in the country looms large. An estimated 85,000 people infected with HIV in Myanmar are not receiving lifesaving treatment. 

As the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria marks its tenth anniversary, people living with HIV/AIDS and those delivering treatment took to the streets in response to drastic funding shortfalls.

The vast majority of people living with the AIDS virus in the Democratic Republic of Congo are deprived of lifesaving treatment.

Dr. Unni Karunakara, international president of MSF, calls on the board of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria to organize an emergency donor conference to renew commitment in the wake of the cancellation of the new round of funding applications.

The cancelation of Round 11 of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria undermines the significant progress that has been made in the uphill battles against these deadly diseases.

MSF International President Dr. Unni Karunakara discusses the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria's decision not to accept grant applications this year to support treatment programs due to a catastrophic drop in donor funding. 

MSF responds to the unprecedented decision taken to cancel a funding round of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria.

Without appropriate funding, the opportunity to reap the benefits of new science showing that HIV treatment both saves lives and helps prevent new infections could be lost.

The financial transaction tax proposed by France and Germany could help save millions of lives if a percentage were allocated to global health, MSF said today.

Several pharmaceutical companies have abandoned HIV drug discount programs in middle-income countries, according to an HIV drug price report released by MSF.

NEW DELHI/BRUSSELS, June 22, 2011–At the United Nations High Level Meeting on HIV and AIDS in early June, India announced that it will not accept data exclusivity, a provision harmful to access to affordable medicines, as part of a free trade agreement (FTA) currently being negotiated with the European Union (EU).

While several countries hardest hit by the AIDS epidemic are improving HIV treatment protocols to reduce deaths and illness, a lack of support from donors prevents many from implementing vital changes.

I am writing on behalf of MSF to express our disappointment that J&J has not yet placed any patent into the Medicines Patent Pool and that it has announced in a recent letter to the Medicines Patent Pool that it is not ready to engage in formal negotiations.

Despite some encouraging trends among people living with HIV in Mozambique, a great deal of work remains to be done.

New WHO directives on the treatment of HIV/AIDS bring new opportunities and new challenges, says MSF's former Head of Mission in Malawi.

India should resist pressure from the EU to accept a free trade agreement that will have an exceedingly negative impact on access to affordable medicines

Several low-income countries highly affected by HIV risk being entirely or partly disqualified from the current funding round by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.

But just as important gains are beginning to show their promise for patients, a stagnation in donor funding, coupled with trade policies that will create serious additional barriers to accessing affordable generic medicines, are dealing HIV/AIDS treatment a double blow.

In 2005, India put in place a patent law—fortunately it’s a law that supports public health objectives, so the result has been that India's generic manufacturers have had some space to continue producing affordable and effective medicines.

Major donor countries have chosen to undercut the main international funding mechanism to save the lives of millions of people at risk of dying from AIDS, TB, and malaria, said the international medical humanitarian organization Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) today.

New York, September 28, 2010 – Country contributions to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria (GFATM)—to be announced at next week’s donor replenishment meeting in New York—are expected to fall far short of the $20 billion needed for the Fund to maintain and expand its grant programs.

MSF Teleconference on Innovative Financing Mechanisms for Global Health, conducted September 20, 2010

The fight against childhood malnutrition and HIV could be transformed by innovative funding mechanisms currently tabled at UN Millennium Development Goals Summit.

Brussels, September 6, 2010—As finance ministers from the European Union gather in Brussels for a formal meeting to discuss the establishment of an EU-wide financial transaction tax, MSF calls on them to dedicate a proportion of the receipts from any fundraising mechanism to global health.

International donors are disregarding scientific evidence and seeking short-term cost savings at the expense of ten million people in need of treatment for HIV/AIDS.

April 26, 2010, Brussels/New York – As the European Commission (EC) and India meet for closed-door negotiations on a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) this week, the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) warns this is the last chance to remove provisions that will block access to life-saving medicines for people living in the developing world.

by Dr. Martin De Smet, Head of MSF's Working Group on Malaria

NY Times Lettter-to-the-Editor on MSF concerns that a provision in proposed U.S. health care legislation will allow pharmaceutical companies to extend monopolies on high-priced, cutting-edge medicines.

London, March 9, 2010 – AIDS leaders gathering in London today face the daunting challenge of implementing new WHO recommendations for earlier treatment with better AIDS drug cocktails at a time when donors are backing away from the promise of “universal access."

Berlin/Ashgabat, December 17, 2009 - The international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has closed its medical activities in Turkmenistan after ten years of working in the Central Asian country.

The Board of Directors of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria recently voted to authorize a new call for proposals in 2010, the success of which will ultimately depend on whether donors commit to fully funding the Global Fund. Without adequate funding, the progress and pace of scale-up of lifesaving HIV/AIDS treatment, particularly antiretroviral therapy (ART), supported by the Global Fund will be threatened.

Today, the good news is that four million HIV-positive people are alive on antiretroviral therapy (ART). The bad news is that MSF teams working to treat HIV/AIDS are witnessing worrying signs of waning international support to combat HIV/AIDS.

Johannesburg/New York, November 5, 2009 — A retreat from international funding commitments for AIDS threatens to undermine the dramatic gains made in reducing AIDS-related illness and death in recent years, according to a new report released today by the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF).

Geneva/New York – April 8, 2009 – A global malaria drug subsidy to be launched this month is failing to look at medical needs and is jeopardizing the future of the most effective malaria treatments that exist today, says international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF).

Tokyo/New York, July 3, 2008 –The international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) today called on G8 leaders who will gather next week in Japan to take bold decisions to adequately finance food aid and nutrition programs directed at young children.

New York/Geneva, March 5, 2007 — On the day of the last hearing in Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis legal challenge against India's Patents Act, the company continues to ignore the global protests asking it to drop the case. The international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) strongly condemns Novartis for pushing forward with the case and is asking the company's shareholders to urge CEO Vasella to withdraw the legal challenge in India, which could jeopardize worldwide access to essential medicines.

In late December 2006, after four years of treating people living with HIV/AIDS in Coatepec, MSF transferred that responsibility to the country's public health agencies. Preparation for the handover had been underway for more than a year. The transfer was implemented gradually, concluding only when the agencies taking responsibility were ready to ensure continuity of care. MSF continues to provide treatment to people living with HIV/AIDS in Puerto Barrios and Guatemala City.

Guatemala/Geneva, November 3, 2006 - On the occasion of the board meeting of the Global Fund to Fight against AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, in Guatemala City, the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is calling for increased efforts from the government of Guatemala and the Global Fund to maintain treatment of patients living with HIV/AIDS and to expand coverage to those not currently under treatment in Guatemala, where an estimated 60 percent of people living with HIV/AIDS requiring treatment do not receive it, according to UNAIDS.

Geneva, April 21, 2006 – Alarmingly few African patients with malaria are getting existing effective treatment that could cure them in a few days, says Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). Four years after the World Health Organization (WHO) issued a global recommendation for countries to switch from old malaria treatments to artemisinin-based combination therapies, or ACTs, and two years after the Global Fund decided to fund ACTs, MSF teams are witnessing government-run health facilities still giving patients old malaria medicines instead of a treatment that works.

January 27, 2005 - The World Health Organization released its "3 by 5" progress report on January 26, 2005 at the Davos World Economic Forum congratulating itself on progress made in the drive to fight the HIV pandemic. But only 700,000, or 12%, of the nearly six million people in need of antiretroviral (ARV) treatment in developing countries have access to it today. Looking at these figures Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), who provides ARV treatment to more than 25,000 patients in 27 countries, comes to the exact opposite conclusion.

On November 8th the World Health Organization communicated mis-information regarding reasons for current shortages of the malaria drug artemether-lumefantrine (sole supplier Novartis, under the trade name Coartem).

On the upcoming meeting of the G8, TRIPS and accees to medicines.

On the occasion of the second Board of Directors meeting of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (Global Fund), scheduled to take place in New York City, April 23-24, 2002.