As part of its mission to save lives, reduce poverty and protect the world against the threat of epidemics, Gavi has helped vaccinate more than 822 million children in the world’s poorest countries, preventing more than 14 million future deaths

Gavi’s impact

• More children survive. The increase in immunisation has helped halve childhood mortality by preventing more than 14 million future deaths and dramatically driven down the incidence of deadly and debilitating infectious diseases.
• Nation building thrives. As children become healthier, they, their families, communities and countries are more able to be economically prosperous and socially stable. For every US$ 1 spent on immunisation in Gavi-supported countries in the 2021–2030 period, US$ 21 are saved in health care costs, lost wages and lost productivity due to illness and death. When considering the value people place on lives saved by vaccines – which is likely to include the value of costs averted plus the broader societal value of lives saved and people living longer and healthier lives – the return on investment is estimated to be US$ 54 per US$ 1 spent. In Gavi’s first 17 years, our work helped generate more than US$ 150 billion in economic benefits in the countries we support.
• And global health security improves. In the face of global challenges, such as climate change, population growth, urbanisation, human migration, fragility and conflict, Gavi has helped countries broaden vaccine coverage and improve their health systems. This makes them less susceptible and better able to prevent disease outbreaks that pose a threat to people in these countries, protecting millions of others around the world.

A Proven Model

Gavi now vaccinates almost half of the world’s children, giving it tremendous power to negotiate vaccines at prices that are affordable for the poorest countries and to remove the commercial risks that previously kept manufacturers from serving them.

Because of these market shaping efforts, the cost of fully immunising a child with all 11 WHO-recommended childhood vaccines now costs about US$ 28 in Gavi-supported countries, compared with approximately US$ 1,200 in the United States of America. At the same time, the pool of manufacturers producing prequalified Gavi-supported vaccines has grown from 5 in 2001 (with 1 in Africa) to 17 in 2019 (with 11 in Africa, Asia and Latin America).

Gavi shares the cost that implementing countries pay for vaccines, which has resulted in more than 495 vaccine introductions and campaigns, dramatically boosting immunisation against virulent diseases. For example, 3% of low-income countries had introduced nationally Haemophilus influenzae type b (Hib) vaccine that protects against diseases like pneumonia and meningitis. Today, Gavi has enabled all low-income countries to introduce this vaccine in their national programmes. Progress on the third dose of Hib vaccine coverage, as well as with pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV), has been so successful that the coverage rate in Gavi-supported countries is now higher than the global average coverage rate. By the end of 2019, 16 countries had transitioned out of Gavi support and are fully financing all vaccine programmes introduced with Gavi support.