The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria raised US$11.34 billion at a pledging event in Johannesburg on Friday, falling well short of its US$18 billion target for the 2027–2029 period.
The Geneva-based organisation is seeking fresh funds in a difficult moment for global health financing, with several major donors reducing support following an aid overhaul in the United States under former president Donald Trump.
“Money will be tight, so we must be smarter,” the Global Fund’s executive director, Peter Sands, told attendees at the event, held on the sidelines of the G20 leaders’ summit. He said “the old model” of development funding was over and stressed that greater self-reliance was essential, but warned that “too abrupt a transition would derail progress.”
Sands added that the Global Fund plans to cut operating costs by 20 percent in 2026.
The United States pledged US$4.6 billion, remaining the group’s largest donor. In 2022, former president Joe Biden hosted the previous replenishment conference and announced a US$6 billion commitment, though the full amount has not yet been delivered under the current administration.
The Global Fund has already warned countries that their existing grants, which run through the end of 2026, will face reductions because of the funding gap.
Since its launch in 2002, the organisation says its programmes have saved 70 million lives, working with governments to distribute insecticide-treated malaria nets, antiretroviral therapy for HIV and treatments for tuberculosis.
The group also missed its target in 2022, when it sought US$18 billion but ultimately raised US$15.7 billion, including just over US$14 billion announced at the pledging event.
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