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The World Health Organisation (WHO) has expressed delight over the appointment of former Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, on her recent appointment as chair-elect of the Board of Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (GAVI).
She will be taking over from Norwegian, Dagfinn Hoybraten in January 2016. Hoybraten was a former Minister of Health in Norway.
A statement by WHO director-general, Dr Margaret Chan, said, “Okonjo-Iweala brings more than 33 years of development and financial expertise to the Gavi Board at a critical period for immunisation in developing countries.”
Earlier this year, WHO warned that vaccines are not being delivered equitably or reliably and that only 1 out of the 6 key vaccination targets for 2015 is currently on track – the introduction of under-utilised vaccines, a target to which Gavi has contributed significantly.
Since 2000, Gavi has supported the immunisation of more than half a billion additional children, leading to 7 million future deaths being averted.
WHO is one of the founding members of Gavi, a public-private partnership formed in 2000, to address global inequities in access to and coverage of available lifesaving vaccines.
“Over the next 5 years, WHO will continue to lead collective efforts to achieve and sustain universal vaccination coverage as outlined in the Decade of Vaccines Global Vaccine Action Plan,”the statement added.