Kenya’s ability to sustain gains made against HIV, tuberculosis and malaria is coming under renewed scrutiny after a drop in international health funding disrupted programmes and exposed the country’s reliance on donors.
The concern is highlighted in the Global Fund’s 2026 Results Report, which says 2025 brought “abrupt and far-reaching cuts in international funding” that severely affected lifesaving health programmes across the world.
Although countries and their partners managed to keep critical services going and preserve progress against the three diseases, the funding shock has raised questions about how such programmes can be maintained when external assistance is no longer assured.
“An abrupt decline in international funding has intensified the need for HIV, TB and malaria responses and health systems to be nationally led, nationally financed and less reliant on external support,” the report says.
The situation is particularly important for Kenya, where government has acknowledged the contribution of US-backed health programmes to efforts against HIV, TB and malaria.
Among the major programmes are the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The Global Fund report gives an indication of how heavily the global response to the three diseases has relied on international resources.
Since 2002, the fund has channelled $28.5 billion into HIV programmes, $10.9 billion towards tuberculosis and another $21.4 billion to malaria interventions.
The investment has been linked to major reductions in deaths in countries where the Global Fund supports programmes. AIDS-related mortality has dropped by 84 per cent, TB mortality by 60 per cent and malaria mortality by 51 per cent over the respective reporting periods.
The programmes continued to reach large numbers of people in 2025.
A total of 26.9 million people were receiving antiretroviral treatment through Global Fund-supported programmes, while 10 million people accessed HIV prevention services.
For tuberculosis, 7.4 million people received treatment during the year.
The malaria response involved testing 367 million suspected cases and treating 167 million cases. Programmes also distributed 196 million insecticide-treated mosquito nets.
The scale of these interventions highlights the possible consequences of unpredictable donor support, particularly in countries where external financing remains an important part of disease control programmes.
Kenya saw this challenge first-hand in 2025 when the United States temporarily halted foreign assistance.
According to the Ministry of Health, the disruption resulted in gaps in HIV and TB services and led to efforts to identify other sources of funding to keep the programmes operating.
The Global Fund report now places greater focus on the need for countries to strengthen domestic financing for health as international support becomes harder to predict.
For Kenya, the funding changes underline the challenge of protecting gains against HIV, TB and malaria while reducing dependence on external assistance that has supported the response for years.