Question to the Department for International Development:

To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what assessment she has made of progress on her Department's development objectives in relation to building resilience against common diseases to tackle preventable child deaths.

The direct and indirect impacts of COVID-19 will affect countries’ health systems and threaten past progress in tackling the common diseases that contribute to the preventable deaths of children. In October 2019, the UK Government committed to work with others to end preventable deaths of mothers, newborns and children by 2030. This will help countries mitigate the indirect impacts of COVID-19 and support their recovery and future preparedness. This includes maintaining essential health services through our bilateral country programmes and multilateral investments and working to strengthen health systems in the poorest countries.

The UK hosted the Global Vaccine Summit on 4 June and raised $8.8 billion for GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance’s, next five years (2021-2025) of work, which includes the UK’s pledge of £1.65 billion. Using these vital funds, GAVI will immunise a further 300 million children and save up to 8 million lives against vaccine preventable diseases.