Question to the Department for International Development:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to ensure that (1) malaria, and (2) non-COVID-19 epidemic, services and programmes in Africa are adequately resourced during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The UK Government recognises that COVID-19 will have significant direct and indirect impacts on health in Africa. Indirect impacts will be the result of disruption to, and a reduction in, health service delivery.

In response, we are flexing our funding and programming. We are building on our long-term investments to mitigate the threat of indirect impacts on various services and goods. These include reproductive health services and commodities as well as essential primary health care services, such as immunisation. We also aim to increase access and reduce prices for essential health commodities.

The UK Government is working with governments to ensure that essential malaria services continue, malaria patients are protected from COVID-19 and malaria programmes make good decisions about redeploying resources to national COVID-19 programmes in a sustainable way. We continue to be the second largest country donor in the global fight against malaria.