UN Foundation gets $139M measles initiative donation

The United Nations Foundation has received a $139.0 million contribution from the GAVI Alliance to support the former's efforts to reduce measles deaths worldwide 90% by 2010. The Measles Initiative is a public-private partnership between the American Red Cross, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the UN Foundation, UNICEF and the World Health Organization. The initiative aims to cut deaths from measles worldwide by this amount, having seen a 60% reduction from 1999 to 2005.

The GAVI Alliance's donation was made possible by the recent creation of the International Finance Facility for Immunization (IFFIm; Marketletters passim). Alan Gillespie, chairman of the IFFIm board, said: "the IFFIm was designed to accelerate availability of resources for priority vaccination programs. The Measles Initiative presents a particularly strong case for this significant investment."