The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria has announced that it will no longer fund schemes in Myanmar (formerly known as Burma) and has temporarily suspended its grants to Uganda. The fund is an independent organisation set up to attract and disburse funds to tackle these diseases.
The decision over Myanmar was attributed to new travel clearance procedures introduced by the military government that severely restrict the movement of staff from the United Nations Development Programme, which was overseeing the projects in the country. It would have restricted the areas in which the programme would have been allowed to operate, said the fund.
The government in Myanmar had also imposed new procedures for procuring medical supplies that, it adds, were vital for the schemes to be implemented. The fund will be phasing out three grants, worth $35.7m (£19.8m; €29m) over two years, by the end of the year.
In a recent report from the Myanmar Ministry of Health, Health Minister Kyaw Myint, said that the health department was playing an important role in "uplifting the health, fitness, and educational standards of the entire nation." But the report admitted that malaria was re-emerging as a public health problem, with drug resistant malaria a problem along the border areas and in some of the gem mining areas. The report suggested that 1.5% of the population was infected with tuberculosis every year. Myanmar had an estimated 338 911 people living with HIV/AIDS in 2004.
"It is with considerable regret that the global fund . . . has had to terminate its grants to Myanmar," said the fund’s executive director, Richard Feachem. "Both the global fund and the [United Nations Development Programme] are very concerned about the tremendous need to provide humanitarian assistance and to prevent further spread of the three diseases in Myanmar."
A spokesperson for the fund admitted that its decision to fund a country whose military regime has been heavily criticised by human rights organisations had always been controversial. But she denied press reports that the fund may have been looking for an excuse to pull out of Myanmar after pressure from the United States.
The London based Burma Campaign UK said that it was disappointed at the fund’s decision but not surprised. "However, we have never called for an aid boycott," insisted Mark Farmaner, acting director of the campaign.
Meanwhile, the decision to temporarily suspend all five grants to Uganda follows a review from accountants PricewaterhouseCoopers, which found serious mismanagement by the overseeing project management unit in the Ugandan health ministry. The unit will have to be disbanded, and new arrangements need to be set up for managing the fund.
The fund said that it would take "all necessary measures" to ensure that lifesaving treatments and condom procurement would not be disrupted by its temporary withdrawal.