This week brought more bad news for the international ecosystem on the shores of Lake Geneva. UNICEF and the WHO have announced new layoffs and relocations, and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, has not been spared.
Some of the world’s largest global health donors—including Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria—have also announced major restructurings as donors scale back their commitments. Both organizations have warned that these cuts could seriously undermine their life-saving work and the hard-won progress made in combating infectious diseases.
Staff at Gavi’s Geneva headquarters are bracing for a second wave of layoffs following the launch, in late October 2026, of a transformation plan that calls for reducing full-time positions by 33% and part-time roles by 40% within its secretariat over the next four years. This year alone, the Vaccine Alliance has already eliminated 155 full-time positions in Geneva after deciding to downsize its global workforce by 24%. READ MORE HERE