A significant challenge to the work of nonprofits and NGOs is finding funds and negotiating with private companies to provide goods and services. The GAVI Alliance, however, does just that. Founded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the GAVI Alliance (formerly the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunizations) has taken public-private partnerships to a new level in the years since 2000.

The GAVI Alliance focuses on negotiating prices for vaccines against such diseases as yellow fever, measles, Human Papillomavirus (HPV), and diphtheria. The vaccine industry often provides these life-saving vaccines at prices far too high for anyone in the developing world to afford, but with the help of the GAVI Alliance, vaccines can be provided at a significantly lower cost.

This practice of public-private partnership allows monoliths in the vaccine industry to provide large amounts of vaccines at manufacturing cost. The high volume of demand can also minimize production costs that contribute to the significantly higher normal costs in the developed world. And while vaccine prices remain high in the developed world, “in a sense,” journalist Gary Stern writes, “wealthier people [in industrialized countries] are subsidizing the lowered prices for poorer people.”

Lower costs can mean life or death for those in the developing world. For example, a recent agreement between GAVI and two HPV-vaccine providers Merck and Glaxo-Smith-Kline brought the price of a $130-dose vaccine to $4.50 a dose for developing countries. These vaccines against HPV — a major risk factor for cervical cancer — are expected to be administered to over 30 million girls by 2020.

The GAVI Alliance also focuses on strengthening health systems in the host country. Instead of GAVI immunization programs operating independently in the midst of poorly developed healthcare systems, the Alliance also provides funding for health system strengthening (HSS) for health service delivery and the establishment of permanent health centers.

With these two focuses, the GAVI Alliance not only contributes where the need is greatest — providing vaccinations for high-risk populations — but strengthens host-countries’ capacity to help themselves in the future, maximizing its effectiveness through a public-private partnership.

– Naomi Doraisamy

Source: GAVI Alliance
Photo: GAVI Alliance