Global Fund Cuts Malaria Grant by $20M
The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria is withholding nearly $20 million originally granted to fight malaria in Cambodia because of the government’s poor use of past Fund dollars. The government blames its poor showing on the Fund’s time-consuming procurement procedures. The Fund awarded the Health Ministry a $56 million grant in 2010 to spend—both on bringing down overall malaria infection rates and containing a strain of the mosquito-born virus increasingly resistant to the best drugs—by the end of this year. But, according to the Integrated Regional Information Network, a U.N.-sponsored news service, Fund spokesman Andrew Hurst said last week that the last $20 million would not be heading to Cambodia because of “performance below the expectations.” …
