Return on investment stories

Uganda shows that tetanus eradication is possible through well supported and coordinated campaigns.

Papua New Guinea, Kiribati and the Solomon Islands lead the way in co-financing their vaccine programmes.

Georgia remains committed to sustaining the impressive expansion of its immunisation coverage.

Health workers and Ministry of Health officials in Tanzania have are gearing up for a huge task as they prepare to introduce a new vaccine against rotavirus, the leading cause of severe infant diarrhoea.

Sudan recently became the first of many GAVI-eligible countries in Africa to introduce a new vaccine to protect children from rotavirus, the leading cause of severe infant diarrhoea.

With nine women and nine men, an independent review committee (IRC) to monitor country progress is GAVI’s first committee to have a gender balance and marks another step forward for gender policy.

Afghanistan illustrates the vital role that civil society plays in providing basic health services in difficult circumstances.

Following the Sudan's introduction of the rotavirus vaccine, GAVI plans to introduce it in 40 GAVI-eligible countries by 2015.

In Ethiopia, GAVI support for civil society organisations is helping the Consortium of Christian Relief and Development Association deliver routine immunisation to even the remotest communities.

Madagascar shows benefits of health interventions with an impressive reduction of its under-five mortality rate.

Despite significant challenges, Honduras has produced remarkable results in expanding its immunisation coverage.

When Kyrgyz doctors first started using the pentavalent vaccine in 2009, officials in the Central Asian nation s health ministry noticed immunisation coverage rates were going down. But the doctors' initial fears turned out to be the vaccine's greatest strength.

Countries such as Armenia can make informed decisions about their immunisation programmes using the expertise and information available through the Alliance.

Dr Agnes Binagwaho, Permanent Secretary for Health at the Ministry of Health, explains why the Government of Rwanda is committed to GAVI's co-financing policy.

Rwanda health centre takes advantage of routine immunisation visits to teach mothers about benefits of family planning.

Since 2008, the number of countries required to co-finance new and underused vaccines supplied by GAVI has nearly doubled from 26 to 47 in 2010.

Training sessions for health workers set to help Kenya achieve its pneumococcal vaccine coverage target.

Just one and half years after Bolivia became the first GAVI-eligible country to introduce the rotavirus vaccine, a disease responsible for almost half of all hospitalisations for diarrhoea from 2006-2008, is on the retreat.

From 2002-2010, GAVI co-funded immunisation against hepatitis B in the west and central provinces of China. Today, less than 1% of children under 5 are chronic carriers of hepB.

The steady rise in the number of vaccine manufacturers based in emerging economies since 2001 represents a tell-tale sign of GAVI's true impact on the vaccine market.

While GAVI was set up first and foremost to help countries introduce new and under-used vaccines, its programme support has also increased global access to the long-existing vaccine against diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis (DTP).

GAVI support for strengthening the Vietnamese health service brings training and resources to even the remotest areas.

GAVI and other leading donors to Nepal channel their financial support through a single system to streamline assistance for the national health programme.

In the first five years of the millennium, Cambodia achieved an almost 30% drop in infant and child mortality rates, but improvements in women's health failed to keep pace.

Vaccines bring added value to the economies of the world's poorest countries with GAVI's investment in immunisation set to yield an 18% rate of return by 2020, according to a Harvard School of Public Health study.