While HIV aid drops, overall global health spending shows “enduring support”

Rabita Aziz
April 17, 2014, 2:01 p.m.

While development assistance to middle and low-income countries for global health reached an all-time high last year, assistance for “the main infectious diseases, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria, contracted on the whole,” according to the Financing Global Health 2013: Transition in an Age of Austerity report published by the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation.

Total development assistance for health was $31.3 billion in 2013, an increase of 3.9 percent over 2012. The report states this increase falls short of the rapid 10 percent annual growth seen between 2001 and 2010, but “the maintenance of substantial levels of international funding is a sign of the international development community’s enduring support for global health.”

The U.S. continued to be the single largest global health contributor, spending $7.4 billion last year but 2013, marks the second consecutive year of U.S. global health assistance reduction, U.S. contributions peak at $8.3 billion in 2011.

In 2013, the United Kingdom increased its global health assistance spending by 24.7 percent over 2012 spending, totaling $1.2 billion in 2013.

The report shows that bilateral aid agencies have reduced global health assistance, while major public-private partnerships such as the GAVI Alliance and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria have continued to expand. Non-government organizations, particularly those based in the U.S., have also stepped up their contributions, helping to offset declines in spending by other organizations. U.S. non-government organizations spent $4 billion in global health in 2013, and those based outside the U.S. spent $895 million.

The report notes that domestic spending on health by low-and-middle income countries far exceeded the amount of development assistance they received, with countries spending $613.5 billion in 2011, which means “countries spent 20 times more of their own resources on health than they received in assistance.” Domestic spending grew at a faster pace than assistance, at 7.2 percent between 2010 and 2011.

The report’s accompanying website details global health funding by time period, source, region, and health focus area.


Source: Science Speaks