Over the past twenty years, Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, has proven to be a high-impact and resilient global health partnership. Launched at the World Economic Forum in Davos in 2000, Gavi has mobilized its network of government, private sector, and civil society partners to make vaccines affordable and available to millions of children in the world’s lowest-income countries. Yet after years of improvements, immunization coverage has now stagnated in some countries, and the challenges posed by demographic change, urbanization, and conflict all threaten to slow global progress. Gavi’s new strategy for 2021-2025 lays out a plan to confront these challenges and reach the most vulnerable children with vaccines, and the organization will seek funding to help it reach its goals at a pledging conference to be hosted by the United Kingdom in June of 2020. The United States has supported Gavi since 2000, and the Alliance’s contributions to health security and efforts to enable countries to move towards sustainable, self-financed immunization programs resonate with U.S. global health and development goals.   On Monday, February 24, from 2:30 to 4:00pm, the CSIS Global Health Policy Center will host a public event focusing on challenges and opportunities for advancing Gavi's work in this new 2021-2025 phase. Following introductory remarks by CSIS Senior Vice President and Global Health Policy Center Director J. Stephen Morrison, Seth Berkley, CEO of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, will deliver a keynote presentation on Gavi’s plans for replenishment and beyond. He will then be joined by Irene Koek, Acting Assistant Administrator for the Global Health Bureau at USAID; Robin Nandy, Principal Advisor & Chief of Immunizations at UNICEF; and Katherine Bliss, Senior Fellow with the CSIS Global Health Policy Center, for a panel discussion examining the role of U.S. support for Gavi as the organization enters its third decade.  Keynote Presentation  Seth Berkley Chief Executive Officer Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance  Introduced byJ. Stephen Morrison Senior Vice President and Director CSIS Global Health Policy Center  Panel Discussion  Seth Berkley Chief Executive Officer Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance  Katherine Bliss Senior Fellow CSIS Global Health Policy Center  Irene Koek Acting Assistant Administrator Global Health Bureau USAIDRobin Nandy Principal Advisor & Chief of Immunizations UNICEF  Moderated byJ. Stephen Morrison Senior Vice President and Director CSIS Global Health Policy Center  This event is made possible through the generous support of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Global Health - Audio

Gavi at Twenty: A Critical Inflection Point

 In 12 short months, the initial UNAIDS Fast Track milestones toward gaining control of the HIV pandemic come due. As we start HIV’s pivotal 2020 year, there is cause for both optimism that progress is being made in important areas and concern that critical obstacles remain. The world is not on track to reach the 2020 Fast Track milestones by the end of the year. The time is now to take stock of the state of the epidemic, understand how different countries and cities are making progress, and correct policy and program implementation issues hindering the HIV response.   On Monday, February 3, 10:30am-12:15pm, the CSIS Global Health Policy Center will host a public event to explore the state of the HIV epidemic: where we are now, what we know works, and what can be accomplished in 2020. The event will include a panel discussion featuring Regan Hofmann, Director, a.i., U.S. Liaison Office, UNAIDS; Jennifer Kates, Senior Vice President and Director of Global Health & HIV Policy, Kaiser Family Foundation; and Greg Millett, Vice President and Director of Public Policy, amfAR. Sara M. Allinder, Executive Director and Senior Fellow of the CSIS Global Health Policy Center, will moderate. Following the the panel, we will screen a sneak peak of the CSIS Global Health Policy Center's upcoming documentary, The Pandemic Paradox: HIV on the Edge, which explores the long arc of the HIV pandemic against the backdrop of continued high levels of new infections and annual deaths.   The discussion will serve as a scene setter for CSIS’s planned April 2020 conference on what needs to be part of a plan to get back on the path toward ending HIV as a public health threat by 2030, which will include the official launch of The Pandemic Paradox: HIV on the Edge.   Panel Discussion Regan Hofmann Director, a.i., U.S. Liaison Office UNAIDS  Jennifer Kates Senior Vice President and Director of Global Health & HIV Policy Kaiser Family Foundation  Greg Millett Vice President and Director of Public Policy amfAR  Moderated by Sara M. Allinder Executive Director and Senior Fellow CSIS Global Health Policy Center Closing Preview of the upcoming documentary, The Pandemic Paradox: HIV on the Edge This event is made possible through general support to CSIS.

Success or Regress? The State of HIV in 2020

This episode explores how China has responded to the deadly outbreak of a new coronavirus originating in the central city of Wuhan. Our guest, Dr. Yanzhong Huang, compares Beijing’s response to its handling of the 2002-2003 SARS epidemic, analyzing what key lessons the government appears to have learned and where it has fallen short. Dr. Huang also describes the varying local and global reactions to the Chinese government’s response efforts, and assesses how Beijing’s ability to control this outbreak will affect the legitimacy of the Chinese Communist Party. Dr. Yanzhong Huang is a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations, where he directs the Global Health Governance roundtable series. He is also professor and director of global health studies at Seton Hall University's School of Diplomacy and International Relations. Dr. Huang has written extensively on global health governance, health diplomacy and health security, and public health in China and East Asia.

Wuhan Goes Viral: A Conversation with Yanzhong Huang

Australia is being ravaged by the worst bushfires seen in decades. Beginning in 2019, the fires have burnt through 25.5 million acres, the size of Denmark and Belgium combined. At least 27 people are dead, including three volunteer firefighters, and more are missing. Thousands of homes have been destroyed or damaged. Australia’s capital cities are experiencing record air pollution, and smoke has been seen as far away as South America. With the fire summer season extending for another few months, the disaster is expected to continue. The scale of these bushfires is unprecedented anywhere in the world. On Monday, January 27th, 5:00-6:30 pm, please join us for a conversation on the impact of these bushfires on regional politics, public opinion, the health of the population, and national economic growth. We will also discuss the cataclysmic scale of the fires and the climate change drivers that have driven the spread of the fires: are they a single natural disaster – a very bad year in a country accustomed to seasonal fires – or evidence of a long-term profound shift?This event is made possible through general support to CSIS.

Climate Change and the Australian Bushfires: A Singular Catastrophe or The New Normal?

Malnutrition has the potential to bankrupt countries and prevent children from reaching their full potential. Unlike other food groups, fruits and vegetables provide beneficial outcomes across all malnutrition forms. Yet, despite the nutritional punch of fruits and vegetables, current global consumption is far below the minimum daily requirements of five portions. Join the Global Food Security Project for the release of Seeds of Change: The Power of Fruits and Vegetables to Improve Nutrition in Tanzania, a new report focusing on how the United States and other donors are trying to boost fruit and vegetable consumption in Tanzania to improve nutrition through multisectoral and public–private approaches. The event will feature a keynote lecture by the former Tanzanian Prime Minister, the Honorable Mizengo Pinda, which will be followed by an armchair conversation. The subsequent panel discussion will explore the unique challenges to fruit and vegetable consumption and current efforts to change dietary behavior.This event is made possible by the generous support of The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The Curious Case of Fruits and Vegetables to Improve Nutrition

In this episode of AIDS 2020, Steve speaks with Tori Cooper at the eighth Annual Atlanta Summit on Global Health on advocacy. As the founder and Executive Director of Advocates for Better Care, and a black transwoman living with HIV, Tori is at the center of these issues. They discuss her life, career, leadership and the continued imperative of community advocacy in driving progress.

Does HIV Activism Still Matter? Another Perspective

Two things need to happen to achieve greater success in the global fight against HIV: dramatically reduce new infections and achieve viral suppression in those already living with the virus. In order to meet these goals, new infections must come down from an annual rate of 1.7-2 million that has been stagnant for a decade, viral suppression must be sustained and ensured for the more than 23 million people living with HIV (PLHIV) on anti-retroviral treatment (ART), and treatment must be provided to the more than 14 million PLHIV not on ART.     New technology offers the potential to facilitate these efforts if they can be utilized effectively.  The July 2019 International AIDS Society science conference in Mexico City highlighted several important technological innovations either already on the market or that will be available in the coming years including long-acting injectable treatment, pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), implants, and broadly neutralizing antibodies as a vaccine.  However, the ongoing experience of starting oral PrEP programs has demonstrated that taking new products to scale for impact is complex and that there are significant obstacles to ensuring access to those in need.   On Tuesday, October 22, 2:30-5:00 pm, the CSIS Global Health Policy Center will host a public event to explore recent developments in HIV prevention and treatment technology, examine successes and challenges in integrating those products into existing service delivery, and discuss how global programs, such as PEPFAR and the Global Fund, need to adapt to ensure access and uptake.  Fireside ChatDeborah Waterhouse CEO ViiV Healthcare  Moderated byJ. Stephen Morrison Senior Vice President and Director  CSIS Global Health Policy Center  Panel DiscussionAmbassador Deborah L. Birx Coordinator of the United States Government Activities to Combat HIV/AIDS and U.S. Special Representative for Global Health Diplomacy  PEPFAR  Charles Lyons President and CEO Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation Mitchell Warren Executive Director AVAC Moderated bySara M. Allinder Executive Director and Senior Fellow CSIS Global Health Policy Center This event was made possible by the generous support of ViiV Healthcare.

Improving Access to Innovative HIV Technology

In 2018, more than 200 million people contracted malaria around the world, and nearly half a million died of it. As countries continue to battle malaria within their borders, the international discussion turns to a loftier goal—complete global eradication of malaria. In this episode of Take as Directed, J. Stephen Morrison sits down with Sir Richard Feachem, Director of the Global Health Group at UCSF Global Health Sciences, and Professor of Global Health at both UC San Francisco and the UC Berkeley. They discuss the Lancet Commission on Malaria Eradication, and their new report that lays out a vision to achieve the eradication of malaria, “Malaria eradication within a generation: ambitious, achievable, and necessary.” Just how plausible is this vision?

Malaria Eradication Within a Generation? How Plausible?

In this episode of AIDS 2020, Stephen Morrison speaks with Mark Heywood on whether HIV advocacy and activism still matters. As a co-founder of SECTION 27 and the Treatment Action Campaign, Mark has been an activist at the forefront of the fight against HIV/AIDS in South Africa for decades. They discuss what Mark sees as the biggest obstacles and opportunities for future HIV efforts.

Does HIV Activism Still Matter?

Since the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals in 2015, countries have been committed to finding a path to universal health coverage – the vision of providing access to quality healthcare for all without risk of financial hardship. This ambitious goal raises myriad questions: What should be covered? Who should be covered? What are the roles of civil society and the private sector in helping governments to achieve universal health coverage (UHC)? How will we pay for it all? Each country will take a different path to UHC – dependent on its demography, disease burden, and resources – but what those paths will look like is not yet clear. These issues have dominated the global health agenda in recent years, culminating in the UN High-Level Meeting on UHC, to be held on Monday, September 23rd, when UN Member States are expected to adopt a political declaration spelling out the parameters for achieving UHC by 2030. On Thursday, October 3rd, 1:00-3:00 pm, please join us for what promises to be a lively roundtable conversation on the outcomes of the UN HLM. Dr. Ranieri Guerra, World Health Organization (WHO) Assistant-Director General leading WHO’s preparations for the UN HLM, will open with a ten-minute overview of the UN HLM.  A roundtable conversation will follow, featuring Dr. Guerra; Jeffrey L. Sturchio, CEO, Rabin Martin; Amanda Glassman, Executive Vice President and Senior Fellow, Center for Global Development, and CEO, CGD Europe; and a senior U.S. government representative. J. Stephen Morrison, Senior Vice President and Director of the CSIS Global Health Policy Center, will moderate. We will also use this occasion to reference the recent book, The Road to Universal Health Coverage: Innovation, Equity and the New Health Economy, edited by Jeffrey L. Sturchio, Ilona Kickbusch and Louis Galambos (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2019). Sturchio, in his remarks, will draw on some of its content. Copies of the book will be distributed at the event. Featured SpeakersDr. Ranieri Guerra Assistant Director-General World Health Organization  Jeffrey L. Sturchio CEO Rabin Martin Amanda Glassman Executive Vice President, Senior Fellow, and CEO of CGD Europe Center for Global Development   ModeratorJ. Stephen Morrison Senior Vice President and Director CSIS Global Health Policy Center This event is made possible by general funding to CSIS.

The UN High-Level Meeting on Universal Health Coverage: What Happened?

In the last decade, Russia has increased its global engagement, while at the same time pursuing policies at home that are giving rise to HIV/AIDS and drug-resistant tuberculosis epidemics that are a risk for its own populations, as well as its neighbors. These developments have unfolded against a backdrop of highly malevolent Russian behavior across many fronts that has resulted in the imposition of extensive sanctions. In this special joint episode of Take as Directed and Russian Roulette, J. Stephen Morrison sits down with Jeff Mankoff, Acting Director of the CSIS Russia and Eurasia Program; and Judyth Twigg, Professor of Political Science at Virginia Commonwealth University and a Senior Associate with the CSIS Russia and Eurasia Program. The three discuss Steve and Judy's recent analysis, “Putin and Global Health: Friend or Foe?” which outlines an opportunity to expand U.S. engagement to promote health security and counter Russian influence in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

Putin and Global Health: Friend or Foe?

While the world has seen tremendous improvement in the availability of life-saving vaccines, new, targeted approaches are needed to address remaining gaps in immunization coverage. Among pressing challenges are completing polio eradication; reaching the disenfranchised, including those in fragile and disordered settings; supporting governments as they develop their own sustainable immunization systems, and; addressing vaccine hesitancy. The World Health Organization (WHO), Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, the U.S. government, and other global immunization organizations are striving to meet these demands as they develop new strategies and programmatic enhancements for the next decade of global immunization. If successful, these advances have the potential to significantly enhance global stability and health security.   The CSIS Global Health Policy Center will host a major conference on September 27 that will examine the innovations that will shape this future. The conference will feature keynote presentations by Seth Berkley, Chief Executive Officer of Gavi; Kate O’Brien, Director of Immunization, Vaccines, and Biologicals at the WHO; and Henrietta Fore, Executive Director of UNICEF. Registration will open at 8:30am. Light refreshments will be served in the morning and lunch will be served at 11:30am. J. Stephen Morrison Senior Vice President and Director, CSIS Global Health Policy Center   Kate O'Brien Director, Immunization, Vaccines, and Biologicals, World Health Organization Seth Berkley Chief Executive Officer, Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance Moderated by:Nellie Bristol Senior Fellow, CSIS Global Health Policy Center   Edna Yolani Batres Presidential Adviser of  Health, Former Minister of Health, Republic of Honduras Muhammad Ali Pate Global Director, Health, Nutrition, and Population, World Bank, and Director of the Global Financing Facility for Women, Children, and Adolescents (GFF) Kerry Pelzman Deputy Assistant Administrator, Bureau for Global Health, U.S. Agency for International Development Anne Schuchat (RADM, USPHS, RET) Principal Deputy Director, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Moderated by:Amanda Glassman Executive Vice President and Senior Fellow, Center for Global Development Henrietta Fore Executive Director, UNICEF   Emilie Karafillakis Research Fellow, Vaccine Confidence Project, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine Rina Dey Communication Director, CORE Group Polio Project, India David Broniatowski Associate Professor, George Washington University  with a video message from:Congressman Adam B. Schiff (D-CA-28) Moderated by:J. Stephen Morrison Senior Vice President and Director, CSIS Global Health Policy Center Nahid Bhadelia Medical Director, Special Pathogens Unit, Boston University School of Medicine Rebecca Martin Director, Center for Global Health, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Violaine Mitchell Interim Director, Vaccine Delivery, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation with a video message from:Senator Roger Wicker (R-MS) Moderated by:Katherine Bliss Senior Fellow, CSIS Global Health Policy Center Nellie Bristol Senior Fellow, CSIS Global Health Policy Center  This event is made possible through the generous support of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.  

Securing Healthy Populations in a New Era of Global Immunization

In this episode, Steve Morrison, Sara Allinder, and Andrew Schwartz discuss the uncomfortable paradox surrounding South Africa’s HIV/AIDS epidemic. At the time of the interview, Steve had recently returned from a documentary filming trip to South Africa, while Sara was completing analysis based on a February 2019 visit noted in her analysis piece, The World’s Largest HIV Epidemic in Crisis: HIV in South Africa. The conversation includes a discussion of the September 2019 outbursts of xenophobic violence and targeted violence against women, and how those factor into the HIV epidemic.

South Africa’s Epidemic: Too Big to Fail?

 The Ebola outbreak in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern by the World Health Organization (WHO) on July 17, has been ongoing for over a year. As of mid-August, there have been over 2,800 cases and 1,900 deaths. The outbreak is not expected to be contained in the near future. Some experts argue that Ebola is becoming endemic to the area and will spread regionally. Médecins Sans Frontières and other NGOs are retooling their approaches to win community trust, while WHO, the World Bank, the U.S. government, and others are putting in place plans for a renewed push in the next six months. Access by seasoned U.S. civilian public health experts to the hot zone remains highly problematic, owing to violent attacks on health providers, the limited capacity of the United States to deploy official civilian experts into austere environments, and a risk aversion born of the Benghazi tragedy. The U.S. response is further constrained by U.S. funding restrictions that limit the scope of assistance to the DRC national government.   This panel will examine how to navigate the formidable barriers to access — the chaos, insecurity, and rampant community resistance in eastern DRC – in this next phase. Panelists will include: Admiral Tim Ziemer, Senior Deputy Assistant Administrator, Bureau for Democracy, Conflict, and Humanitarian Assistance, USAID; Ella Watson-Stryker, Humanitarian Representative, Médecins Sans Frontières; and Jeremy Konyndyk, Senior Policy Fellow, Center for Global Development   Moderator: J. Stephen Morrison, Senior Vice President and Director, Global Health Policy Center, CSIS   This event was made possible through the support of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

Access in the Hot Zone: Navigating the DRC Ebola Outbreak

While the world has seen tremendous improvement in the availability of life-saving vaccines, coverage rates have stagnated over the last decade. The U.S. government, a leading player in global immunization, is working with international organizations as they develop new strategies to accelerate progress toward global goals. On Friday, September 27th, CSIS will host a conference on global immunization to explore these issues. As a primer to that event, we take you back to a conversation from last winter between Nellie Bristol and Dr. Orin Levine, Director of Global Delivery Programs and former Director of Vaccine Delivery for the Global Development Program at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Dr. Levine joined us on this episode of Take as Directed to discuss new innovations in achieving equity, increasing demand for immunization, and reaching the unreached with vaccines to secure the health and stability of all populations.

Rethinking Vaccine Delivery

The relationship between health and security is an area of increasing importance in the twenty-first century. The Global Health Policy Center bridges foreign policy and public health communities by creating a strategy for U.S. engagement on global health. The research topics covered include family planning, maternal and child health, immunizations, and infectious disease, among others. Find the latest research from our scholars and CSIS events on this topic below.

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Global Health - Audio

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