Gavi Deputy CEO Anuradha Gupta explains how the Vaccine Alliance is working to reduce the gendered barriers that can prevent both boys and girls accessing immunisation services.

Geneva, 26 November 2018 - Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, has become the first global health organisation to be certified as an equal salary employer by the EQUAL-SALARY Foundation, a Swiss non-profit organisation focusing on equal pay for women and men.

“I am extremely proud that Gavi is leading the way as an equal salary employer,” said Anuradha Gupta, Deputy CEO of Gavi the Vaccine Alliance. “We will continue to work tirelessly to ensure the Gavi Secretariat is an inclusive and equitable environment, in which every employee feels valued. And we won’t stop there – we are also committed to reducing gender barriers in the countries we support to ensure a person’s health is not dictated by their gender and that mothers, the primary care givers, are empowered to access quality services for their children.”

Gavi has implemented a proactive gender policy to ensure equal access to immunisation for boys and girls in the countries it supports. Gavi also provides funding for health systems to help countries address barriers to immunisation, including those related to gender.

As part of this effort, Gavi-supported countries are encouraged to analyse and understand how vaccine coverage varies by sex, income and geographic location to help identify reasons for low immunisation coverage in certain groups. Efforts to better understand gender-related barriers and activities are crucial to finding solutions to these obstacles, which may prevent both boys and girls from being immunised.

“As the largest provider of life-saving vaccines to children in the developing world, the Alliance believes that access to vaccines and better health should be an equal right for all,” said Anuradha Gupta.

“The equal salary certification is an important achievement and sends a positive message about Gavi’s values,” said Catherine Pawlow, Gavi’s Director of Human Resources. “60% of Gavi staff and half of our senior leaders are women. This reflects part of a wider effort by the organisation to increase the diversity of our workforce at Gavi - we now have people of over 75 nationalities working at the Secretariat.”

Earlier this year, Gavi was also named amongst the highest scorers in a report on gender equality by Global Health 50/50. The report measured 140 global health organisations on indicators such as gender strategy for programmes, the collection of disaggregated data and the gender parity of senior management.

The EQUAL-SALARY Foundation is a Swiss non-profit organisation and a member of the UN Global Compact. It has been commended by the European Commission and its methodology was used as a reference by the Swiss Federal Court of High Justice. To date, 43 companies have been certified.