We are beyond thrilled and hugely appreciative of the team at GiveWell with
whom we have been working on this grant for a number of months.
US$212m of this grant is funded by Coefficient Giving, and we are exceptionally grateful for their further support for AMF's work. Coefficient Giving has been a supporter of AMF since 2011.
The GiveWell team has spent hundreds of hours liaising with the AMF team,
analysing data, discussing plans, looking at models, testing operational
planning, interviewing key partners and working with us to ensure what is
being funded is likely to have significant impact.
This is the largest grant GiveWell has ever made, the largest previously
being a US$96.8m grant to AMF in December 2024, and we believe this is the
largest grant ever to a UK health charity.
100% of this grant is for the universal net coverage campaign in the
Democratic Republic of Congo for 2027 to 2029. Along with funding from the
Global Fund, it will ensure we will together achieve universal coverage of
the entire country, all 26 provinces.
Above all, this is wonderful news for the people of the Democratic Republic
of Congo, one of the two countries worst affected by malaria and where there
is a significant opportunity to affect health outcomes.
Approximately 90 million nets will be funded to protect 160 million when
they sleep at night from the bites of malaria-carrying mosquitoes, that
would otherwise cause severe illness or worse.
Last year in DRC ~70,000 people died from malaria and ~50 million fell ill.
70% of the deaths were children under 5, with pregnant women the next most
affected group.
Over three years, AMF estimates this grant has the potential to prevent ~70,000 deaths and
~50 million cases of malaria and can be expected to
improve the local economy by USD3.3bn (12x the donation amount).
When people are ill, they cannot farm, drive, teach - function, so there is
economic impact as well as humanitarian impact.
AMF has been working in DRC for the last 12 years, funding 19 million, 59
million and 55 million nets in each of the last three three-year
distribution cycles.
In this time, the AMF team has built strong strategic partnerships with key
organisations and developed deep operating knowhow, all focused on the
data-driven accountability of nets delivered. Of the last
197 million nets AMF has distributed, the lost/stolen/damaged portion is
0.09%.
AMF is a team of 18 people. We have extensive partnerships with many
organisations who all play a crucial role in ensuring the success of a
large-scale, nationwide, universal coverage net campaign. DRC is two thirds
the size of Western Europe.
Partners include co-funders (the Global Fund, the US Government), in-country
health authorities (the DRC's Ministry of Health and the National Malaria
Control Programme), as well as a number of implementation partners and,
separately, independent in-country monitoring partners.
AMF works very closely with The Global Fund's DRC team in planning and
throughout operations. AMF has legal agreements in place with DRC's health
authorities, and works closely with the National Malaria Control Programme
that has a central role. The NMCP's staff, as well as the front line staff
carrying our household registration and household distribution, are the
unsung heroes of a highly effective net campaign.
AMF funds and carries out with partners, extensive independent monitoring,
(planning monitoring, registration monitoring, distribution monitoring, and
post-distribution monitoring for three years) from which extensive data is
generated that together helps deliver an accountable and effective net
distribution and the monitoring of its impact.
Accurate household registration data, that underpins a successful net
campaign is collected using GPS-enabled smartphones by many thousands of
data collectors who are trained in accurate data collection. Data are
closely monitored.
This grant helps enormously in reducing the funding gap AMF sees. Including
DRC, we estimate AMF could successfully deploy more than US$600m across
opportunities we have evaluated so far. This is after we have considered the
funding being brought to malaria control by The Global Fund and our estimate
of what is likely to be brought forward by the US Government. Beyond DRC,
there is a funding gap of ~US$200m in Nigeria, and at least US$100m in seven
other countries.
The remaining funding gap reminds us that every US$2 donation matters as,
while there remain these significant funding gaps, every net matters as each
one protects two people, often a mum and baby, when they sleep at night. A
net is fundamental.
Our focus with our DRC program is now firmly on working with our partners to
deliver operational excellence so nets are received by beneficiaries as
intended.
We look forward to reporting openly on our progress in the months ahead.