The G8 Gleneagles Summit: Doubling Aid to Africa

At the G8 Summit in Gleneagles, Scotland, leaders focused on Africa and climate change. They agreed to double aid to Africa and to eliminate outstanding debts of the poorest countries. As outlined in the Gleneagles communiqué the G8 nations will together increase aid to developing countries by around $50 billion a year by 2010. Of this, at least $25 billion will go to Africa.

The G8 leaders also promised increased support for African peacekeeping forces to help to deter, prevent and resolve conflicts in Africa, and pledged additional investment in education and the fight against HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis and other killer diseases.

Crucially, G8 leaders took an important step to scale-up anti-malaria initiatives:

"Working with African countries to scale up action against malaria to reach 85% of the vulnerable populations with the key interventions that will save 600,000 children's lives a year by 2015 and reduce the drag on African economies from this preventable and treatable disease. By contributing to the additional $1.5bn a year needed annually to help ensure access to anti-malaria insecticide-treated mosquito nets, adequate and sustainable supplies of Combination Therapies including Artemisin, presumptive treatment for pregnant women and babies, household residual spraying and the capacity in African health services to effectively use them, we can reduce the burden of malaria as a major killer of children in sub-Saharan Africa."
(from Gleneagles Communiqué)

Malaria in the spotlight