Cuts to international aid funding are already affecting efforts to combat AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, the head of the Global Fund has warned.
Peter Sands, executive director of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, said countries had managed to soften the immediate effects by redirecting domestic resources. However, he warned that the funding reductions could worsen health outcomes in the coming years if they continue.
“There is no doubt that the reductions in external funding have had an impact on health outcomes,” Sands told reporters on Wednesday.
He said countries prioritised immediate life-saving services in 2025, meaning treatment received more attention than prevention and longer-term programmes.
“Treatment, in a sense, did better than prevention,” Sands said, explaining that governments focused on ensuring sick people continued to receive care.
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The Global Fund invested about $5.3 billion between 2024 and 2026, according to Sands. The organisation is awaiting World Health Organization data for 2025 to assess the impact of funding cuts on lives.
The United States, Britain and other major donors have reduced their international aid contributions. Sands said the cuts had also led to the deprioritisation of activities such as healthcare worker training, capacity building and infrastructure development. He warned that further reductions would become increasingly difficult to absorb without a growing impact on public health.
Sands said malaria was his biggest concern because funding for the disease was already inadequate. The WHO estimates that malaria kills more than 600,000 people globally each year.
“It is the issue that keeps me awake at night,” he said.
The Global Fund says programmes supported since its creation in 2002 have helped save 72 million lives and contributed to a 65% reduction in the overall death rate from AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.
Sands stressed that continued investment was necessary to prevent progress against the three diseases from being reversed.
