The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria will appeal for donations to raise $18 billion (17.7 billion euros) to save 20 million more people from these diseases.

"We have made enormous progress," noted the Global Fund, a global partnership created in 2002 to combat these three diseases, in its annual report released today, pointing out that 50 million lives have been saved in the past 20 years.

"But our struggle is not over," the Fund warned Lusa, pointing out a series of crises, from climate change and conflict to the covid-19 pandemic, that "threaten with a setback."

The Fund will hold a fundraising appeal in New York next week, in which it hopes to raise at least $18 billion (€17.7 billion) to cover its programs in the period between 2024 and 2026.

Bringing together governments, multilateral agencies, bilateral partners, civil society groups, people affected by the diseases, and the private sector, the Fund estimates that the funding would help reduce HIV, tuberculosis, and malaria-related deaths by nearly two-thirds and save 20 million lives.

Last year, it warned that the covid-19 pandemic in particular was having a devastating impact on its efforts, leading it into decline for the first time in its history.

However, the Fund said today that the huge resources it has mobilized are paying off and that "recovery is underway." Since March 2020, the Global Fund said it has invested more than $4.4 billion (€3.9 billion) to combat the covid-19 pandemic and mitigate its impact on its programs.

Fund chief Peter Sands, however, emphasized that "although most countries fighting HIV, tuberculosis and malaria have begun to recover from the ravages of covid-19," accelerated efforts are needed to meet the goal of "ending these diseases by 2030."

Sands insisted that the 50 million lives saved in two decades are "proof that global commitment can reverse the world's deadliest infectious diseases."

The Global Fund, which provides nearly a third of all international funding to fight HIV, said the number of people receiving antiretroviral therapy last year rose to 23.3 million, up from 21.9 the previous year.

The number of people reached by prevention services rose again after falling in 2020, reaching 12.5 million people worldwide, he added.

But about 10 million people living with the virus do not have access to these drugs, he warned. And while AIDS-related deaths have dropped 50 percent since 2010 to 650,000 last year, it fell short of the goal of reducing deaths to less than 500,000 a year by 2020.

The pandemic has had a particularly severe impact on the fight against tuberculosis, with many resources diverted to fighting covid-19. By 2020, 1.5 million people died of tuberculosis, making it the second deadliest infectious disease after that caused by SARS-CoV-2.

But the Global Fund, which provides 76% of all international funding to fight TB, is seeing signs of improvement. By 2021, the number of people on treatment was 5.3 million, including 110,000 patients with resistant TB, Sands said.

The pandemic has also weighed on the fight against malaria, with service disruptions and raising deaths by 12% in 2020 to about 627,000.

But the Fund noted a recovery in its programs, with some 280 million suspected cases tested and 148 million treated last year. At the same time, 133 million bed nets were distributed.