Child health in developing countries received a boost in June, when international donors, led by the UK, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Norway, pledged US$4.3 billion to the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (GAVI), exceeding the agency’s fund-raising target by $600 million. The money will finance vaccines for more than 250 million children in poor countries by 2015, helping to prevent the premature deaths of 4 million children, the GAVI Alliance said.
The new pledges come on top of donors’ previous commitments, bringing total resources available to GAVI for 2011–15 up to $7.6 billion. This amount is twice as much as the funding received by GAVI ($3.8 billion) during its first decade of operation. GAVI estimates that poor countries will also contribute up to $100 million in co-financing for the vaccines during 2011–15. UK Prime Minister David Cameron hosted the pledging conference and offered the largest pledge, $1.3 billion.
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