New avian flu facility awards its first grant

The Avian and Human Influenza Facility, a multidonor financing mechanism administered by the World Bank, announced today that the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (PDR) was awarded a grant in the amount of US$2 million for the Avian and Human Influenza Control and Preparedness Project.

This grant is the first approved by the Facility, which was created with generous commitments by eight donor agencies, including the European Commission as lead initiator and largest donor, to help the poorest developing countries prepare and implement integrated country action plans designed to reduce the social and economic impact of avian influenza and minimize possible outbreak of a human flu pandemic. The grants are intended to support integrated interventions in the animal and human health aspects.

This grant is in addition to a US$4 million IDA grant approved by the World Bank under the Global Program for Avian and Human Influenza Control andPreparedness (GPAI). The GPAI provides emergency financing to participating countries, in order to contain outbreaks of avian flu through early detection and rapid response measures and to help countries prepare for a possible human influenza pandemic.

The Facility and IDA grants are part of a comprehensive US$14 million package to address the priorities already identified in the Lao PDR Government’s National Plan for avian and human influenza control. Other support for Government’s efforts is being provided by bilateral donors, multilateral agencies, a number of UN organizations, including FAO, WHO, UNICEF, and UNSIC, and a grant from the Policy and Human Resources Development (PHRD) Program funded by the Government of Japan.

Arif Zulfiqar, who heads the Bank’s department responsible for processing all Facility grant applications, said, Today’s approval marks the start of a series of similar actions that will assist many other countries to maximize their readiness status and protect their citizenry from a potentially devastating threat. In particular, the Bank is committed to help the people and Government of the Lao PDR to make sure that the poor and vulnerable can benefit from quality public health care as well as reforms in the animal health system, and that public financial resources are used effectively to respond in the best possible way to the avian and human flu situation, and help avert a possible human pandemic with the devastating social and economic impacts this would imply.