A recent audit by the European Court of Auditors said a lack of EU funding for vaccine coordination and supply has left shelves in partner countries empty.
The ECA report, published on Wednesday (2 October), examined EU funding for health projects from 2007 to early 2024, selecting projects in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Burundi and Zimbabwe. .
ECA Commissioner George Marius Heisler said: “There is an urgent need to make better use of EU funds, in particular by improving funding allocation criteria, ensuring the adequacy of administrative costs and addressing project sustainability.” said.
Global health funding from the EU has increased since 2007, but auditors found serious coordination problems with partner countries, leading to permanent out-of-stocks on medicine shelves in Zimbabwe, for example, and vaccines. This has led to low availability and duplication of interventions.
This happened despite the EU launching a Global Health Strategy in November 2022 to strengthen health systems and medicine supply chains around the world and improve access to medicines, including vaccines.
The ECA report comes at a time when the Democratic Republic of the Congo has recently been declared a public health emergency of international concern by the World Health Organization (WHO), in parallel with the deepening humanitarian and hunger crisis in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. and the ongoing outbreak of clade type Ib mpox in East Africa.
“Although the mpox outbreak occurred after the audit’s fieldwork was completed, our report addresses issues related to the delivery and distribution of medicines and the sustainability of programs supporting health systems.”ECA said.
The report suggests a lack of alignment between local needs and EU funding. This issue was prevalent even before the current MPOX outbreak.
Furthermore, this audit shows that mpox is not the only health concern facing African health systems and that further funding domestically and internationally must be secured alongside a realistic transition and exit strategy. It emphasizes that this is key to safeguarding the sustainability of global health programs.
Rowan Dunn, EU advocacy coordinator at Global Health Advocates, said the audit was “particularly relevant to the preparation and initial negotiations of the EU’s next multiannual financial framework, expected to be presented to the European Commission in 2025”. said.
“The recent mpox epidemic is a symptom of global health injustice and the need to take action to improve equitable access to quality health services, which is a global health safety and health crisis.” “It’s a universal responsibility,” she said.
(Edited by Martina Monti)
