ODA Spending 

How much ODA does Italy allocate to global health?

Italy prioritizes health and provides staunch support to multilateral health organizations. In 2022, Italy contributed US$764 million ODA to global health, or 10% of its ODA, at par with the OECD DAC average. Italy was the 7^th largest OECD DAC donor to global health in 2022 in absolute terms. Global health ODA decreased by 25% in 2022, likely due to a decline in COVID-19 support.

How is Italian global health ODA changing?

As with the rest of its ODA, Italy delivers most of its health ODA multilaterally. Italy hosted the first replenishment of the Global Fund in Rome in 2005 and has steadily increased its contributions since. However, in 2022, Italy delivered only 39% of health ODA multilaterally, decreasing from 64% in 2021.

How does Italy allocate global health ODA?

Bilateral Spending 

Italy spent 62% of total health ODA bilaterally in 2022. This included US$331 million in the form of earmarked funding to multilaterals, which is counted as bilateral ODA.

45% of bilateral health ODA in 2022 was used for COVID-19 control, followed by 26% for infectious disease control, 6% for medical services, and 5% for basic health infrastructure.

Multilateral Spending and Commitments

Italy spent US$295 million, or 39% of total health ODA, multilaterally in 2022 as core contributions to multilateral organizations.

Top multilateral recipients of Italy's health ODA were the EUI, the Global Fund, and the IDA.

Funding & Policy Outlook  

What is the current government's outlook on global health ODA?

Health was reaffirmed as a strategic priority in the Programming Guidelines and Directions for Italian Development Cooperation 2021-2023, with a focus on HSS, MNCH, non-communicable chronic diseases, communicable diseases, and mental health.

In January 2024, Italy hosted the Africa-Italy Summit to launch the pilot programs of Italy's flagship foreign policy initiative, the Mattei Plan for Africa, which identifies health as a priority area of intervention. Objectives include strengthening health systems, improving accessibility and quality of primary MNCH services, strengthening local capacities for the management, training, and employment of health personnel, research, and digitalization, and developing strategies and systems to prevent and contain health threats, particularly pandemics and natural disasters.

As part of Italy's G7 presidency in 2024, the C7 has set up seven working groups, including a dedicated group for global health.

Under Italian leadership, G20 countries pledged to redistribute US$100 billion of the US$650 billion in SDRs returned in 2021 to LICs in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Italy and other G20 countries announced that they would channel 20% of their SDR allocation to vulnerable countries.

Key Bodies