PMI Announces Emergency Loan Guarantee Facility to Shore Up Private Sector Health Care for Malaria During COVID-19

With up to 50 percent of the population in some parts of sub-Saharan Africa seeking care for fever in the private sector, private health care providers play a vital role in ensuring malaria and other essential health services continue safely during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the pandemic has posed significant challenges for private sector health facilities in Africa and without additional resources many are at risk of closing.

To help ensure private health facilities have the resources they need to stay afloat during COVID-19, the U.S. President’s Malaria Initiative (PMI) collaborated with USAID’s Center for Innovation and Impact (CII), the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC), and global partners to create a loan guarantee facility to support privately owned small and medium size health care facilities in five PMI partner countries.

“The private sector provides millions of people in Africa with essential health care for malaria and other diseases,” said U.S. Global Malaria Coordinator Dr. Ken Staley. “PMI is proud to support this effort to help ensure they can continue their life-saving work during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond.”

A catalytic $700,000 investment by PMI matched by $1.5 million from the Rockefeller Foundation, the Skoll Foundation, and the MCJ Amelior Foundation enables a $17 million loan guarantee from the DFC. In total, the “Open Doors African Private Healthcare Initiative” (ODAPHI) unlocks more than $30 million in working capital for financially struggling private sector health care providers in Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Uganda.

Expected to reach approximately 1600 facilities, the loans will be administered by the Medical Credit Fund and will average $17,000 per provider. Funds will be used to help stabilize operations, purchase essential supplies including personal protective equipment, finance small-scale construction to protect patients from COVID-19, and support the provision of essential health services for malaria and other diseases to over five million Africans.

The loan guarantee facility will be managed by Malaria No More and is an initiative of the Health Finance Coalition, a group of leading philanthropies, investors, donors, and technical partners focused on mobilizing private investment to transform health care and promote health equity in Africa.

Read the full press release here