News outlets highlight findings from a new report from Bill Gates, co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Ray Chambers, U.N. envoy for financing the health Millennium Development Goals and for malaria.

Associated Press: Bill Gates and U.N. say malaria could be eradicated by 2040
“Malaria could be wiped out by 2040, despite the lack of an effective vaccine, previous failed attempts to eradicate the disease, and drug resistance problems, the United Nations and Microsoft founder Bill Gates said in a report released on Monday…” (Cheng, 9/28).

U.N. News Centre: Report by U.N. and Gates Foundation presents vision for eradicating malaria by 2040
“…The report — From Aspiration to Action: What Will It Take to End Malaria? — urges major donors and malaria-affected countries to expand their commitment to the fight against the disease, noting that eradication could save 11 million lives and unlock $2 trillion in economic benefits…” (9/28).

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The Guardian: U.N. hails impressive gains on education and reducing child mortality in Africa
“When African leaders return home after this month’s U.N. summit in New York, they must be ready to implement innovative policies, seek fresh financing, and beef up their data if they hope to build on progress made over the past 15 years and turn the Sustainable Development Goals into reality, according to a new report [from the U.N. Development Programme]…” (Chonghaile, 9/28).

U.N. News Centre: African leaders at U.N. cite ‘remarkable’ progress on MDGs and urge commitment to post-2015 agenda
“African leaders speaking at the U.N. General Assembly debate [Monday] noted that their countries were guided by the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) over the last 15 years, and that the post-2015 development agenda and the new goals adopted last week, embody the collective ambition to transform the world by 2030…” (9/28).

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MSNBC: U.N.: AIDS can be stopped by 2030, but stigma remains a barrier
“The world is on its way to ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030, asserted a panel of heads of states and dignitaries on the eve of the start of the 70th United Nations General Assembly on Sunday. … Stigma remains the chief obstacle in squashing new HIV infections…” (Neese, 9/28).

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Healio: U.S. ambassador: AIDS still ‘not under control’ in Africa
“…Speaking this month at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s annual Africa BrainTrust event, [U.S. Ambassador Deborah Birx, global AIDS coordinator and special representative for global health diplomacy at the State Department,] who also oversees the implementation of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), said the epidemic continues to ravage populations throughout the continent. … According to Birx, another major hurdle to treating HIV/AIDS in Africa and other parts of the world is the stigma against and the discrimination of victims and patients…” (Laday, 9/28).

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Reuters: Sierra Leone starts new countdown to Ebola-free status
“Sierra Leone has released its last two known Ebola patients and begun a new 42-day countdown to a declaration that it is officially free of the virus, officials said on Monday…” (9/29).

VOA News: Sierra Leone Begins New Ebola 42-day Countdown
“… ‘We are very much cautiously optimistic that we will graduate into the 42-day without any relapse but we are intensifying — as a government and medical people — that we must not compromise the medical measures that will contain Ebola for its eventual eradication,’ [Abdulai Bayraytay, national publicity and outreach coordinator in the office of Sierra Leone’s government spokesman,] said…” (Butty, 9/28).

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Next Outbreak, a multimedia collaboration of the GroundTruth Project and NOVA Next in association with WGBH Boston, published two more articles in its series.

NOVA Next: Are We Prepared? An Exclusive Interview with WHO Director-General Margaret Chan
“…On the heels of the United Nations adopting new global development goals for 2030, Chan [on Monday] spoke before heads of state and public health advocates at UN headquarters. There she stressed the importance of building universal health coverage and resilient national public health systems. In an earlier interview with The GroundTruth Project and NOVA Next, Chan discussed how WHO should deal with emerging infectious diseases and drug resistance — and how the world should prepare itself for future pandemics…” (Silberner/Miley, 9/28).

NOVA Next: The Middle East’s Mystery Virus
“…Researchers are only just beginning to understand how MERS infects humans, with lingering questions about why certain populations that should be at high risk for the disease remain unscathed by it…” (Reznick, 9/23).

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New York Times: Children With HIV More Likely to Die of Malaria
“Children infected with HIV appear much more likely than those who are not to die with severe malaria, a new study has found. It may make sense to give these children malaria drugs protectively, the authors said. … The study, led by researchers from New York’s Albert Einstein College of Medicine and Michigan State, was published online in the journal mBio…” (McNeil, 9/28).

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NPR: Even Poor Countries End Up Wasting Tons Of Food
“…As much as half of the food grown or produced in the developing world simply never makes it to market. And that loss is costing billions of dollars and blighting countless lives. … We spoke to [John Mandyck, chief sustainability officer at United Technologies Building & Industrial Systems and co-author of the book Food Foolish: The Hidden Connection Between Food Waste, Hunger and Climate Change,] about the problem of food waste…” (Smith, 9/28).

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U.N. News Centre: Rabies 100 percent preventable, U.N. health agency says on World Day
“…Vaccinating dogs is the most cost-effective strategy for preventing rabies in people, which leads to tens of thousands of deaths, mostly in Asia and Africa, according to the United Nations World Health Organization (WHO). … WHO, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), and the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) are initiating an international conference on the global elimination of dog-mediated human rabies from 10 to 11 December 2015 in Geneva…” (9/28).

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New York Times: The World Needs to Build on Its Success Against Malaria
Editorial Board

“…[T]he United Nations and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation are calling on the world to eradicate [malaria] by 2040, potentially saving 11 million lives in the next 25 years. They say this goal can be achieved for between $90 billion and $120 billion and would produce economic benefits of $2 trillion. … With sustained strategies, some countries will be able to eradicate the disease within their borders. But this will not happen unless industrialized nations, as well as fast-growing developing countries, put more money into research, drugs, bed nets and insecticides. As the Ebola epidemic last year in West Africa showed, the health systems of poor countries need long-term investments so that they are prepared to cope with epidemics of all kinds, not just a single disease…” (9/29).

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Washington Post: Bill Gates and the golden age of global aid
Michael Gerson, opinion writer

“…The billionaire’s main contribution to global health is the manner in which he combines technology, aspiration, resources, and rigor. … Gates both drives and reflects a remarkable trend. Over the past 25 years, efforts to help the global poor have been massively ambitious and massively successful. … In this generation, remarkably effective [government and public-private] institutions to fight poverty and disease have been created that most Americans probably have never heard of. … This is — implausibly but truly — the golden age of aid. … Where, outside the best of corporate America, do you see such voluntary, strategic disruption? Such commitment to measured outcomes? It is the precise opposite of the way most people view spending on global health and development. But it is common practice in the golden age of aid” (9/28).

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Devex: Here’s how we end extreme poverty
Alex Thier, assistance administrator for the Policy, Planning, and Learning Bureau at USAID

“… [T]his week, the United States Agency for International Development launched a Vision to End Extreme Poverty. … The last few decades have demonstrated that any country, on any continent, with the right mix of good leadership and good policies can lift its population out of poverty. … The U.N. Sustainable Development Summit is a chance for governments, companies, and civil society to demonstrate the will to end extreme poverty. Getting there will take a real commitment of resources, human capital, innovation, measurement, and above all, partnership. As big as the end goal seems, far more people have been lifted out of poverty than remain — and a solution is at hand” (9/25).

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Project Syndicate: The Business of Improving Global Health
Jörg Reinhardt, chair of the Novartis Board of Directors

“…Moneymaking social ventures are self-sustaining and have the potential to grow, bringing benefits to more and more people. They are a potentially powerful complement to philanthropy, which has underpinned much recent progress in public health. … [Public-private] collaboration has already shown that working across traditional boundaries, making creative use of technology, and developing pragmatic solutions can yield impressive results. Bringing health care to everyone on the planet is a great challenge. It will take imagination, cooperation, and hard work. Greater involvement by business could increase the likelihood of getting there by 2030” (9/29).

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Al Jazeera America: Fixing the broken bones of India’s health system
Akash Goel, physician and journalist

“… [India Prime Minister Narendra] Modi should prioritize the health of his people. … He can start in two simple ways. First, India’s public health expenditures should reflect global standards. … The second way Modi can prioritize health is by embracing data transparency and setting standardized goals for environmental and public health outcomes. … Investing in and targeting health outcomes will yield dividends many times over, through increases in productivity and, in turn, economic growth. This is prudent policy, not only for India’s people but also for it’s future” (9/29).

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PEPFAR: Statement From Ambassador Deborah L. Birx, M.D., U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator & U.S. Special Representative for Global Health Diplomacy on Translating the Vision Into Action: Fast-Tracking to an AIDS-free Generation
In this statement, Birx discusses the administration’s launch of new PEPFAR HIV prevention and treatment targets for 2016 and 2017, highlighting U.S. investments in initiatives including the DREAMS partnership, which aims to “ensure that adolescent girls and young women have an opportunity to live Determined, Resilient, Empowered, AIDS-free, Mentored, and Safe lives;” the Robert Carr Civil Society Networks Fund (RCNF) Replenishment “to build the capacity of civil society and bring often marginalized populations out of the shadows and into health care clinics;” and a joint two-year initiative with UNAIDS to strengthen the capacity of faith communities to respond to HIV (9/28).

PEPFAR: Fact Sheets and Infographics
PEPFAR recently released several fact sheets and infographics, including a fact sheet describing PEPFAR’s commitment to using data to achieve an AIDS-free generation; a fact sheet and infographic discussing the new PEPFAR HIV prevention and treatment targets; and a fact sheet and infographic describing the DREAMS partnership (September 2015).

Center for Global Health Policy’s “Science Speaks”: PEPFAR announces prevention, treatment targets, highlights “DREAMS” for young women
Antigone Barton, writer and editor of “Science Speaks,” discusses PEPFAR’s announcement of new HIV prevention and treatment targets, highlighting remarks from Birx on the “role that treatment upon diagnosis could play in preventing infections to young women” and the DREAMS initiative (9/28).

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U.S. Department of State: Harnessing the Data Revolution for Sustainable Development: U.S. Government Commitments and Collaboration with the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data
This U.S. State Department fact sheet outlines the U.S. commitment “toward increasing the availability and application of public data that span many parts of the 2030 agenda. … [T]he Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data (Global Data Partnership), launched on the sidelines of the 70th United Nations General Assembly, is mobilizing a range of data producers and users — including governments, companies, civil society, data scientists, and international organizations — to harness the data revolution to achieve and measure the Global Goals. … As a founding member of the Global Data Partnership, the United States is committed to broadening and deepening its leadership in the collection, analysis, use, and release of data to achieve and measure the Global Goals…” (9/28).

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Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s “Impatient Optimists”: A Transformation in Health Debates
Jasmine Whitbread, chief executive of Save the Children International, highlights recent discussions about efforts to achieve universal health coverage. “…Now that the world’s governments have endorsed UHC, we need practical proposals for how to finance it fairly, how to prioritize essential services for the poorest, and how to measure progress…” (9/28).

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Open Society Foundations’ “Voices”: Reaching the Movable Middle on Abortion in Latin America
Mónica Roa, vice president of strategy and external relations for Women’s Link Worldwide, commemorates “September 28 [as] the Global Day of Action for Access to Safe and Legal Abortion, a movement that originated in Latin America and the Caribbean, and has since spread throughout the world.” She discusses efforts to legalize abortion in several Latin American nations (9/28).

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Global Health Technologies Coalition’s “Breakthroughs”: Research Roundup: a promising Ebola treatment, access to drugs for NCDs, a new approach to treating a deadly bacterium, and the perception of breakthrough drugs
Kat Kelley, GHTC’s senior program assistant, highlights recent news in global health research, including a public-private partnership to develop an Ebola treatment, efforts by Novartis to increase access to its medicines in low- and middle-income countries, research on potential treatments for the bacterium Clostridium difficile, and a study examining language used in describing certain experimental drugs (9/28).

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