Question to the Department for International Development:

To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, whether the Government is taking steps to allocate funding under the Global Fund's covid-19 Response Mechanism to ensure the effectiveness of ongoing programmes to tackle (a) TB, (b) HIV and (c) malaria.

The UK is a proud supporter of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria. We are the second largest donor to the Sixth Replenishment, pledging up to £1.4 billion for 2020 - 2022 to fight HIV, TB, and malaria and support health systems, contributing to achievement of universal health coverage and Sustainable Development Goal 3 of “Good Health for All”. We support the Global Fund’s swift action to allow countries to re-programme or use savings from their current grants, and their rapid creation of the COVID-19 Response Mechanism (C19RM), which together have created up to £1 billion of flexibility for countries to respond to COVID-19 and its impacts on HIV, TB, malaria, and health systems.

This Government has already pledged up to £764 million of UK aid on responding to COVID-19 and we are taking our leadership role in global health very seriously. We are using UK aid to its full effect to counter the health, humanitarian, and economic risks and impact of this pandemic in the developing world. We will continue to consider all options for our future support.