This commentary is part of a report in the CSIS Department of Global Development series entitled Global Development Recommendations for the Next Administration.
The next 12 months will be crucial for multilateral global health institutions, which have helped build healthy populations, fostered political stability, and supported U.S. national security interests. In an unprecedented context confluence During the replenishment cycles, three institutions – (1) Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, (2) the Pandemic Fund, and (3) the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria – will seek all funding for multi-year work plans, just as the new administration and Congress take power. This promises to be a time of anxious reflection.
Since the early 2000s, the United States has championed the Global Fund, Gavi, and, more recently, the Pandemic Fund, each of which adopts a public-private partnership model and engages implementing countries in co-financing process. But organizations’ current fundraising cycles are fraught with uncertainty. At the national level, bipartisan consensus on global health is crumbling, as a conservative critique debates the merit of global health programs, questioning the level of true ownership by partner countries and whether these investments advance priorities security of the United States, notably competition with China. Abroad, populism has led loyal donors to leave the field or divert their funding to climate change, domestic resettlement needs, and crises associated with wars in Ukraine and the Middle East.
The next administration will have to decide whether it cares enough to rebuild its commitments domestically and internationally, follow through on existing obligations, and protect long-standing investments in global health security.