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US health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr has said the Trump administration is halting funding for a global vaccine group that provides free jabs for meningitis, malaria and other disease prevention.
Kennedy said in a video statement on Wednesday that Gavi, an international vaccine alliance that includes Unicef and the World Bank, had ignored science and failed to justify the billions of dollars it had received in US funding.
Until it could justify scientific accuracy “the US won’t contribute more to Gavi”, he said.
Kennedy, a former Democrat and a vaccine sceptic who joined President Donald Trump’s government this year, has vowed sweeping changes to the vaccine rules and healthy eating as part of his so-called Make America Healthy Again agenda. His positions have received backlash from pharmaceutical groups and medical experts.
Geneva-based Gavi has said it received $300mn from the US in 2024. The US was the largest donor for its Covid-19 vaccine programme.
Gavi said in a statement that it agreed with Kennedy on the need to consider all available science — “as it has always done”.
“We look forward to further engagement and to a continued partnership with the US government,” it wrote.
The US withdrawal further hampers Gavi’s fundraising efforts. The group is also facing a nearly 25 per cent cut from the UK, historically the organisation’s second-biggest donor after the US.
The British government said it would give £1.25bn for five years starting next year, down from £1.65bn in the current budget cycle. Norway, another big funder, has also reduced its pledge.
“The impact of these cuts on children in the world’s poorest countries will be devastating, likely leading to an uptick in disease and death from vaccine-preventable diseases,” said Janeen Madan Keller, deputy director of global health policy at the Center for Global Development, a US-based non-profit group.
The Gates Foundation, another large donor to Gavi, would not fill the gap in funding, philanthropist and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates said in an interview with the Financial Times. Gates called on governments to keep funding the vaccine alliance.
“For the first time in decades, the number of kids dying around the world will likely go up this year instead of down because of massive cuts to foreign aid,” he said. “Fully funding Gavi is the single most powerful step we can take to stop it.”
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