This was originally published on Global Health TV on July 27, 2015.
As the end
of the era of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) (2000-2015) draws near,
we who work in global health can look back with some satisfaction at the $228
billion that was allocated to address the three health-related MDGs during that
time.
Although
spending grew rapidly in the first ten years, it was stagnant between 2010 and
2014, and actually decreased by 1.6% between 2013 and 2014. Global health
funding in 2014 amounted to $36 billion in 2014 (of which $1 billion was for
Ebola).
That information
comes from Financing Global Health 2014: Shifts in Funding as
the MDG Era Closes,
the annual report of global health funding published last month by the Institute
for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME).
And two
weeks ago, the Kaiser Family Foundation and UNAIDS issued a report that showed that although there was only a slight increase in funding for HIV in low- and middle-income countries in
2014 (less than 2%), seven of 14 donor countries actually decreased funding
despite the recent gains made against the epidemic.
