|
|
SPAIN'S LA
CAIXA FOUNDATION GIVES €4
MILLION TO GAVI ALLIANCE FOR CHILD IMMUNISATION:
15/02/08
(MaximsNews Network)
|
UNITED
NATIONS - / MaximsNews Network / - 15
February 2008 --
La Caixa Foundation (Fundacion Caja de Ahorros y Pensiones de Barcelona) has
announced a €4 million donation to the GAVI Fund’s Immunise
Every Child Campaign. The money will be used to help vaccinate children in
the world’s poorest countries against life-threatening diseases.
La
Caixa Foundation is Spain’s largest corporate foundation and ranks second in
Europe and fifth worldwide.
The
GAVI Alliance is a unique partnership that combines public and private sector
leadership and resources to strengthen health systems and bring the benefits of
immunisation to those greatest in need, saving millions of lives.
The
€4 million gift is the largest grant made by the foundation to a single
organisation and the largest received by the Immunise
Every Child Campaign, the private philanthropy programme GAVI launched last
year. The campaign is building a community of private donors to GAVI who endorse
GAVI’s high return on investment and are dedicated to making childhood
immunisation a top philanthropic priority.
Isidro
Fainé, president of the La Caixa Bank and La Caixa Foundation, said:
“It is very satisfying for La Caixa to join with the GAVI Alliance and thus
contribute to illness prevention and the improvement of countries’ health
systems.”
GAVI
Executive Secretary Dr. Julian Lob-Levyt welcomed the gift. "We very much
appreciate this new support from La Caixa Foundation, a GAVI partner since March
2005 when the foundation co-hosted a high-level symposium on child mortality in
Barcelona. La Caixa's gift provides further evidence of strong private interest
in the work of the GAVI Alliance, as well as the significant contribution that
the private sector is making to GAVI's work. We look forward to our close
collaboration with La Caixa over the years ahead."
The
donation will help children in the world’s poorest countries receive
life-saving vaccinations, including hepatitis B (HepB) and Haemophilus
Influenzae type b (Hib), in combinations with diptheria, tetanus, pertussis,
(DTP3); and also yellow fever vaccine. It will also fund auto-disable
syringes and injection safety boxes, which reduce the risk of HIV infection as
needles can only be used once and are safely disposed of in boxes after use.
The
Spanish royal house had a key role in bringing the GAVI Alliance to the
attention of La Caixa Foundation. A supporter of GAVI since 2005, la Infanta HRH
Princess Cristina of Spain spoke at the launch of the Immunise
Every Child Campaign in New York last year and is an honorary founding
member of the Every Child Council, the campaign’s recognition and leadership
body.
The
announcement of the gift comes as the Princess of Spain, Mr Fainé and Jaime
Lanaspa, the newly appointed executive director of La Caixa Foundation, travel
to Mozambique this week. Graça
Machel, chair of the
GAVI Fund, invited the group
to see for themselves, among other things, GAVI’s work in the country.
Since 2001, GAVI has provided a total of more than US $17 million for
immunisation in Mozambique. One resulting success has been the introduction of
hepatitis B vaccine. Coverage has risen to more than 70% in the country.
Ms
Machel noted: “I am delighted that La Caixa Foundation, which has been a vital
source of financing for development in Mozambique, has announced this new
support to the GAVI Alliance. These resources will help GAVI and its partners to
deliver life-saving vaccines to children in the poorest countries of the
world.”
While
in Mozambique the La Caixa team will also visit the Centro d'Investigaçao em
Saude da Manhiça with which La Caixa Foundation has been collaborating on
various projects through the Centre de Recerca en Salut Internacional de
Barcelona since 2001. The International Social Works Cooperation Program of La
Caixa has been fostering the development of Mozambique since 1997 prioritising
the execution of educational and health projects.
About
the GAVI Alliance
The
GAVI Alliance is a public-private partnership of major stakeholders in
immunisation. It includes developing country and donor governments, the World
Health Organization, UNICEF, the World Bank, the vaccine industry in both
industrialised and developing countries, research and technical agencies, NGOs,
and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. WHO estimates that GAVI support
will have prevented more than 2.9 million deaths by the end of 2007.
GAVI's
efforts are critical to achieving the Millennium Development Goal on child
health, which calls for reducing childhood mortality by two thirds by 2015. Of
the 9.7 million children who die before reaching their fifth birthday every
year, 2.5 million die from diseases that could be prevented with currently
available or new vaccines.
The
GAVI Alliance has received a total of more than $3 billion in funding from
private sources such as The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the European
Commission and the World Bank, and governments including Australia, Canada,
Italy, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway,
South Africa, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
The
GAVI Alliance was formerly the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation.
The
GAVI Fund’s Immunise Every Child
Campaign was
established in January 2007 to engage visionary private philanthropists in the
rapidly expanding work of the GAVI Alliance. It is building a community of
donors and cause advocates to make childhood immunisation a top philanthropic
priority.
La
Caixa is the biggest savings bank in Spain, while La Caixa Foundation, a €500
million-a-year foundation, is the number one corporate foundation in Spain, and
ranks as the second biggest European foundation and fifth at a global level.
Since 1997, the International Social Works Cooperation Program of La Caixa has
collaborated on 345 projects in 56 countries, with a contribution of more than
€31.5 million. The principal axes of action are: socio-economic development,
the formation of social capital in Africa and humanitarian action.
People
with HepB have a 15-20% risk of dying prematurely from liver cirrhosis or
cancer. An estimated 360 million people are chronically affected with the
hepatitis B virus. Hib is estimated
to be responsible for some three million serious illnesses and 386,000 deaths
annually, chiefly through meningitis and pneumonia. DTP3 is a basic
life-saving vaccine but each year 28 million children do not receive it.
Finally, there are 200,000 estimated cases of Yellow Fever annually, more than
30,000 of these resulting in death.
For
more information contact:
Jeffrey
Rowland, GAVI Alliance
+ 41 79 240 45 59 mobile
jrowland@gavialliance.org
Jesus
N Arroyo, La Caixa Foundation
+ 34 629 79 12 96
Julius
Salsas, La Caixa Foundation
+34 93 404 60 56
Photo
requests:
Ariane Manset
+41 22 909 6521 office
amanset@gavialliance.org
B-roll:
Download at http://www.gavialliance.org/media_centre/videos/broadcast/index.php
Labels:
GAVI Alliance, Immunisation,
Immunization,
La
Caixa Foundation, Julian
Lob-Levyt, Immunise
Every Child Campaign, Isidro
Fainé,
United
Nations, U.N.,
~~~~~
MaximsNews.com, An Independent Voice from the
U.N., provides commentary and analysis from
leading world figures: King Abdullah II
(Jordan), HRH Prince Zeid Ra'ad Zeid Al-Hussein
(Jordan), Sir Brian Urquhart, Hans Blix, Amb.
Richard Holbrooke, Anwar Ibrahim, Bianca Jagger,
Dr. Nafis Sadik, Shashi Tharoor, Thoraya Ahmed Obaid, Noeleen Heyzer,
Masood Haider, Kerry
Kennedy, Ian Williams, Stephen Schlesinger, Sen.
Timothy E. Wirth, Marc Morial, Amb. Jayantha
Dhanapala (Sri Lanka), Amb. Pierre Schori
(Sweden), Amb. William H. Luers, Susan Roosevelt
Weld, Rory Kennedy, Mehri
Madarshahi, Hazel Henderson, Donald Wheeler, J. Michael Adams, Gloria Feldt,
Jeffrey Laurenti, Ashley
Bommer, Rory
O'Connor, Genevieve Stamper, Max Stamper and
others.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MaximsNews®
LLC
NEWS NETWORK FOR THE
INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY
MaximsNews Network® LLC is a Global News Network reaching over 30,000 in the International Community. It is associated with MediaChannel.org and Globalvision News Network, global news and media information services with more than 350 news affiliates in 135 countries.
Established in 1999.
The views expressed are the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of MaximsNews®
LLC.
MaximsNews.com
U.N. ® LLC www.MaximsNews.com
| MaximsNews@MaximsNews.com |
Please
contact us about Republishing:
Syndication@MaximsNews.com ©Copyrights 1999 -
2008, MaximsNews® LLC. All rights
reserved.
|
