Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, helps vaccinate almost half the world’s children against deadly and debilitating infectious diseases

By improving access to new and under-used vaccines for millions of the most vulnerable children, the Vaccine Alliance is transforming the lives of individuals, helping to boost the economies of lower-income countries and making the world safer for everyone.

The Power of Partnership

Gavi’s impact draws on the strengths of its core partners, the World Health Organization, UNICEF, the World Bank and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and plays a critical role in strengthening primary health care (PHC), bringing us closer to the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) of Universal Health Coverage (UHC), ensuring that no one is left behind.

Gavi also works with donors, including sovereign governments, private sector foundations and corporate partners; NGOs, advocacy groups, professional and community associations, faith-based organisations and academia; vaccine manufacturers, including those in emerging markets; research and technical health institutes; and implementing country governments.

History

By the late 1990s, the progress of international immunisation programmes was stalling. Nearly 30 million children in developing countries were not fully immunised against deadly diseases, and many others went without any immunisation at all.

At the heart of the challenge was an acute market failure; powerful new vaccines were becoming available, but lower-income countries simply could not afford most vaccines.  

In response, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and a group of founding partners brought to life an elegant solution to encourage manufacturers to lower vaccine prices for the poorest countries in return for long-term, high-volume and predictable demand from those countries.

In 2000, that breakthrough idea became the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation – today Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.