[Title] Speech by Prime Minister KISHIDA Fumio at the Global Fund's Seventh Replenishment Conference

The Honorable, Joe Biden, Jr., President of the United States of America,

Mr. Peter Sands, Executive Director of the Global Fund,

Excellencies, distinguished guests, dear colleagues and friends,

It is a great pleasure for me to attend the 7th Replenishment Conference of the Global Fund. I remember very well when I, myself, hosted the preparatory meeting for the 5th replenishment in Tokyo as Minister for Foreign Affairs, and I am happy to return today to the Global Fund family as Prime Minister of Japan.

With the lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic, infectious disease control and the strengthening of the preparedness for future pandemics have become more important than ever. I praise President Biden for hosting today's conference.

The Global Fund has been playing a major role in global health. Through its investments, it has reached the remarkable achievement of saving over 50 million lives from the three major infectious diseases, namely HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. I would like to applaud the efforts and contributions by all those who have made this possible, including Executive Director Mr. Sands.

Our goal, however, is to end those infectious diseases by 2030, and we don't have much time left. To achieve this goal, all stakeholders of the international community, including donors, implementing countries, the private sector and civil society, need to mobilize all efforts. To this end, we need to further domestic resource mobilization in implementing countries, and expand blended finance projects with loans from the World Bank. We also hope to see further contributions from new donors and the private sector.

Colleagues,

In the investment case of the 7th replenishment of the Global Fund, strengthening of health systems was explicitly set as a goal, adding to the traditional countermeasures against the three major infectious diseases. Strengthening health systems will surely lead to better preparedness for future pandemics, and will also contribute to achieving universal health coverage (UHC). We need to unitedly work together to accelerate this.

Based on such convictions, I hereby reaffirm Japan's pledge to contribute up to 1.08 billion dollars over the next three years to the Global Fund, which was established after the G8 Kyushu-Okinawa Summit.

The Japanese government and related organizations will take stronger leadership in decision-making regarding the activities of the Global Fund. We will also make contributions through Japan's advanced technologies and innovations.

Next year, Japan will host the G7 Hiroshima Summit. Japan will continue to take the lead in global health and work together with stakeholders towards strengthening global health architecture which contributes to prevention, preparedness and response to future pandemics based on the Global Health Strategy that Japan formulated last May. Japan will also continue to lead efforts towards achieving UHC in the post-COVID-19 era in order to tackle a wide range of global health issues that has been disrupted by COVID-19, including response to infectious diseases.

Let me conclude by expressing my sincere hope that the Global Fund activities continue to bring about tangible results, supported by the close partnership of all stakeholders. Now is the time to bring together all the wisdom and determination of everyone in the world and to take a significant step towards building a society where "no one's health should be left behind." Thank you.