Canada gives $790M to help vaccinate in more vulnerable countries

It is Canada’s biggest-ever pledge to GAVI — $100 million more than a multi-year promise in 2016.

“COVID-19 has demonstrated that viruses do not know borders,” Gould said in a statement Tuesday when she announced the commitment.

“Our health here in Canada depends on the health of everyone, everywhere.”

Gould also pledged $190 million over four years to support the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, a partnership between several international agencies, including GAVI and the World Health Organization.

The money is intended to prevent a resurgence of polio and other communicable diseases for which vaccines already exist.

ONE Canada, an advocacy group aimed at eliminating world poverty, applauded the investment.

“While countries around the world are fighting COVID-19, it’s crucial that routine immunizations continue so that we don’t have to deal with other diseases like measles spreading at the same time,” said director Stuart Hickox.

The federal government says the wild poliovirus, which mainly affects young children and can cause permanent paralysis, has been eliminated from 99.9 per cent of the world’s regions.

The WHO reported 176 cases of the wild poliovirus in 2019, and has discovered 54 cases so far this year, the vast majority of them in Pakistan.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 12, 2020.

Laura Osman, The Canadian Press

by The Canadian Press

Canada gives $790M to help vaccinate in more vulnerable countries

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