Statement on the Commission for Africa Report – Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

SEATTLE -- Patty Stonesifer, co-chair and president of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, made the following statement today on the report issued by the Commission for Africa, chaired by U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair:

The Gates Foundation congratulates Prime Minister Blair for his leadership and vision in convening the Commission for Africa, and for giving new energy to the effort to reach consensus on how best to tackle Africa's development challenges. We hope the Commission's recommendations will receive the attention they deserve. The international community’s response must be real and immediate. Lives are at stake and the time for action is now.

It is important to acknowledge that, while Prime Minister Blair has driven this effort, the Commission's recommendations are based largely on input from African leaders. In addition to the African representatives on the Commission, many African government, business, and community leaders contributed to the report through a series of consultations and dialogues.

As an organization committed to promoting global health equity through the development and introduction of new tools and technologies, the foundation welcomes the Commission's focus on the important linkages between health and development. The Commission's recommendations to significantly increase funding and build human capacity and physical infrastructure to fight Africa's major killers—including HIV/AIDS, TB, malaria, and child and maternal mortality—require urgent action at the 2005 G8 Summit and beyond.

The Commission's recommendations are particularly timely and relevant in light of the findings from the recent UN Millennium Project that sub-Saharan Africa is far behind on progress towards the Millennium Development Goals. The guidance provided by this document should help mobilize the additional efforts needed to accelerate progress towards these goals in sub-Saharan Africa.

Several important new initiatives are addressed in the Commission’s report and deserve special attention. With U.K. leadership, an International Financing Facility to support childhood immunization may soon be launched which could serve as a model for implementation of the larger International Financing Facility and save millions of children’s lives.  Significant new commitments for health have also been mobilized through the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria and through the G-8's endorsement of the Global HIV/AIDS Vaccine Enterprise—a new alliance focused on accelerating the search for an HIV/AIDS vaccine.  Finally, the Commission’s call for sustained and predictable resource flows and for donors to develop new incentives for health-related research that will benefit Africa is particularly significant.

The Commission's report will play a critical role in the months ahead in focusing international will on the urgent need to develop solutions for Africa's most pressing problems. It is clear that, particularly in the health sector, these problems can be solved with adequate resources, leadership, and commitment.  We hope that the Commission’s recommendations will motivate the kind of urgent, comprehensive response that will save lives and enable African communities to prosper.

For additional information on the Commission for Africa report, click on the link below.

www.commissionforafrica.org