Vaccination during a mobile clinic. Photograph by Ben Milpas
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About the "Dear GAVI" Campaign

Photograph by Ben Milpas
Vaccination during a mobile clinic. Photograph by Ben Milpas
This article is more than 11 years old.

#DearGAVI: Help MSF reach more of the most vulnerable children with life-saving vaccines!

The GAVI Alliance negotiates price reductions for newer vaccines and, through its donors (such as the UK, the US and Norway), pays for these vaccines to be introduced in developing countries. MSF fully supports GAVI’s mission, but is concerned that the prices agreed for vaccines are still too high, and wants GAVI to put more pressure on the pharmaceutical companies to bring prices down further.

Additionally, MSF is frustrated by the fact that non-governmental organisations and humanitarian actors such as MSF are not able to buy vaccines at these lowest available prices (even though the prices are still too high!) when we want to vaccinate some of the world’s most vulnerable children. These include children in refugee camps, HIV-positive children, malnourished children, or those that are older than one year and therefore fall outside the age range of routine immunisation programmes.

MSF has requested that GAVI and vaccine manufacturers extend their discounted prices to us and so far, we have been given the run-around. Non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and humanitarian actors are partners in extending access to vaccination. Particularly in the world’s poorest countries, civil society helps to deliver health services, and in some areas, NGOs are the only actors able to access children with vaccines. This is done in collaboration with other global health actors, and in cooperation with ministries of health.

Meanwhile, we have been trying for four years to find a workable solution to access the vaccine that protects children against pneumonia in some of the countries where we work. We can’t waste time negotiating with companies on a case-by-case basis each time we want to vaccinate, and we can’t rely on company charity through one-off donations – which do not provide sustainable, long-term solutions for reaching the 22 million unvaccinated children.

Take Action

Help MSF, send GAVI a message on Twitter asking for them to open up their lower prices to non-governmental organisations and humanitarian actors like MSF now.

We are pursuing all official routes to try to get GAVI to change its policy, but need your help to pressure GAVI and pharmaceutical companies to give us access to their discounted prices so we can reach more of the most vulnerable kids.