Sri Lanka’s unified proposal titled ‘One Vision, One Shield: Sri Lanka’s Integrated One Health Pandemic Preparedness & Response’ was among the selected recipients during the Pandemic Fund’s second round of funding allocation. Five implementing agencies (FAO, ADB, WB, WHO, and UNICEF) jointly supported the development of the proposal with the One Health stakeholders in Sri Lanka.
The grant amounts to 17 million USD for a period of three years starting January 2025. Sri Lanka is also a recipient country through the multi-country proposal submitted for the WHO South-East Asia region. This funding will enable Sri Lanka to implement the recommendations of its most recent Joint External Evaluation and the subsequent National Action Plan for Health Security across the areas of surveillance, laboratory capacities and health workforce.
The second round of the Pandemic Fund grant allocations were released on 18 October 2024 with aims of strengthening pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response capacities in 40 countries across six geographical regions. The two rounds of funding to date amount to US$885 million, mobilizing an additional US$6 billion in support of 75 countries, half of which are low- and middle-income countries.
Avoiding future pandemics requires investing substantially more in prevention, preparedness, and response. The Pandemic Fund provides a dedicated stream of additional, long-term financing to strengthen critical pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response (PPR) capabilities in low- and middle-income countries through investments and technical support at the national, regional, and global levels.
The Pandemic Fund aligns with the Health Emergency Prevention, Preparedness, Response and Resilience (HEPR) framework of the World Health Organization under the financing arm, providing catalytic financing to transform national HEPR capacities. These investments, which target gaps in surveillance, laboratory capacity, risk communication, zoonotic diseases, risk management and more, will help avert the much larger costs that the world would incur in a future pandemic.
Read the official press release from the Pandemic Fund here:
