June 30, 2016
On June 29, the Senate Appropriations Committee approved a Fiscal Year (FY) 2017 State Department and foreign operations appropriations bill. This legislation recommends $8.67 billion in funding for many lifesaving global health programs, including global HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria assistance. Global HIV/AIDS programs would receive the largest portion of this funding, with almost $6 billion going to the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Global Fund. The Committee’s FY 2017 funding recommendation for the Global Fund is $1.35 billion.
The legislation also reverses proposed cuts to tuberculosis programs that were included in the President’s FY 2017 budget request. The Committee allocates $241 million for global tuberculosis programs implemented by USAID, which is $50 million above the President’s request and $5 million more than FY 2016 funding. The bill also includes $745 million for the President’s Malaria Initiative – a $71 million increase from FY 2016.
Friends of the Global Fight thanks State and Foreign Operations Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Ranking Member Patrick Leahy (D-VT), and the hardworking Subcommittee staff for their bipartisan leadership in support of global health programs to fight HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. Full Committee Chairman Thad Cochran (R-MS) and Ranking Member Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) also showed great leadership in moving this important legislation through the appropriations process. U.S. funding for these programs has contributed to saving tens of millions of lives through the distribution of lifesaving medicines and prevention tools, such as insecticide-treated bed nets to protect against malaria. Friends of the Global Fight looks forward to continuing to work with both the Senate and the House Appropriations Committees to maximize FY 2017 investments to the Global Fund and to U.S. bilateral global health programs so that the United States remains the leader in the fight to defeat HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.
Later this year, the Global Fund and the Government of Canada will host the Fifth Replenishment Pledging Conference to raise funds for the Global Fund’s 2017-2019 funding cycle. The Global Fund is seeking to raise $13 billion, pledged from the public and private sectors, which would enable the Global Fund partnership to save an additional 8 million lives and avert 300 million new infections of HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, as well as advance our shared goal of ending these diseases as epidemics by 2030. We must continue to urge the United States and our global partners to make robust investments in high-return, public-private partnerships like the Global Fund, which has saved 17 million lives since 2002. Sustained funding is critical to continuing the Global Fund’s lifesaving work.
