1 March 2013 - New York - The United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has appointed Ray Chambers as the first ever Special Envoy for Financing the Health-Related Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and renewed his mandate as Special Envoy for Malaria.
In his new capacity, Mr Chambers will work with United Nations agencies, funds and programmes to promote and secure increased investment by the public and private sectors to achieve the health-related MDGs on child and maternal mortality, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis (TB), malaria and other diseases by the end of 2015.
"Mr Chambers has been very successful in mobilizing resources and public-private partnership in the fight against malaria," Mr Ban said. "Now, with the urgent need to secure funding for the health-related MDGs, I have asked the Special Envoy to develop a business plan to ensure that we have the resources to achieve our goals."
Mr Chambers, a philanthropist, has served as one of the Secretary-General’s MDG advocates since 2010. In 2012, Mr Chambers founded the MDG Health Alliance and in January 2013 he joined the Board of Directors of GBCHealth as co-chair. He previously served as Chairman of The Millennium Promise Alliance and as Chairman of Wesray Capital Corporation, which he co-founded.
"Time is running out. We have just 1000 days to deliver against the MDGs. At the current rate of progress, we are aware that many of the countries hardest hit by TB - especially in the African and European regions - are not going to meet the MDG-related targets," said Dr Lucica Ditiu, Executive Secretary of the Stop TB Partnership.
"We welcome the Secretary-General’s decision to make funding for health an urgent priority and we are confident that Ray will help to get us back on track. Sadly, we are currently paying the price of years of chronic underinvestment and reduced commitment to TB. Every minute we lose three lives to this disease, which is now occurring around the world in extremely drug-resistant forms and threatening us all. Ray has already made great strides in applying business principles to the fight against Malaria, and we look forward to working with him in this new expanded role."