Dr. Diana Atwine, Uganda’s permanent secretary for health ministry (PHOTO/Courtesy)
KAMPALA —Over the next three years, the Global Fund will invest up to $587milliin about UGX 2 trillion to help fight malaria, TB and HIV in Uganda.
The programme will avert at least 11,056 deaths of children under 5 and prevent 989,000 malaria cases, contributing to the government’s priority on tackling preventable maternal and child deaths.
Interventions under the programme will include support to Indoor Residual Spraying and Integrated Community Case Management of malaria, diarrhoea and pneumonia. It will also strengthen district capacity to prevent and control malaria in high burden districts, Dr. Diana Atwine, the Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Health told reporters in Kampala.
This funding is part of the Global Fund for AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (GFATM) to help Uganda take forward critical actions in the fight against malaria.
Uganda has the third highest number of annual deaths from malaria in Africa, as well as some of the highest reported malaria transmission rates in the world. Malaria has an indirect impact on the economy and development in general, driving high household expenditures on health, causing lost productivity, and slowing down economic growth.
Dr Atwiine was speaking on the side-lines of a consultative meeting on the priorities for HIV, Malaria and TB, for the new funding coming in from the Global Fund.
The meeting organized by the Uganda Country Coordinating Mechanism for the Global Fund (CCM) at Protea Hotel in Kampala, was called to discuss how the money will be prioritized.
Uganda is currently undergoing severe Malaria epidemic, whose prevalence had been reduced from 49% to 9% in 2019.
Andrew Musoke, the CCM Board Chairman told ChimpReports at the meeting that emphasis will be put on community based initiatives in utilization of the Global Fund money.
“After Covid the health system has been quite broken, there are so many things we want to do but there isn’t enough money; so we need to prioritize how we are to spend this money to make sure that it is used effectively,” he said.
Tonnie Luyimbazi, the CCM Secretariat Coordinator said today’s meeting was the final part of the mandatory consultative process before the Global Fund money can come in.
He added that the discussions focused on strengthening of resilience systems from the grassroots in combating the three epidemics
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