US funding cut for Gavi vaccines could cause ‘over a million deaths’: CEO

The Gavi vaccine alliance’s chief said on Thursday that any cut in US funding risks causing more than a million deaths, following a report that Washington is set to back out.

“A cut in Gavi’s funding from the US would have a disastrous impact on global health security, potentially resulting in over a million deaths from preventable diseases and endangering lives everywhere from dangerous disease outbreaks,” the international vaccine organisation’s chief executive Sania Nishtar told AFP by email. (BSS/AFP)