Equitable Access Initiative

Publisher: The Global Fund

The Equitable Access Initiative (EAI) was launched in early 2015 by the heads of multilateral organizations engaged in global health: GAVI, the Global Fund, UNAIDS, UNDP, UNFPA, UNICEF, UNITAID, the World Bank and WHO. The purpose was to consider alternatives to GNI as a framework to assess countries’ need for external financial support for health. Currently, the convening organizations use GNI in different ways to determine key policies, including eligibility and co-financing policies.

A high level panel was established with co-chairs Pascal Lamy, former head of the World Trade Organisation, and Donald Kaberuka, former head of the African Development Bank. At the first EAI Expert Panel Meeting in February 2015, Panel members and the nine convening organisations were in agreement that the World Bank’s GNI per capita country classification system, designed for World Bank lending decisions, was being used far more broadly in health-related decisions. The conveners of the Initiative commissioned four expert academic groups to develop options for a new health framework.

Based on the analyses of the four analytical teams and the co-convenors, as well as extensive consultations, this report explores a health framework that can account for health need, income levels, and health funding considerations, which could inform different stages of decision-making by the convening organizations’ governing bodies or other bilateral and multilateral organizations involved in external financial support for health.