But keeping those gains will require more than the vaccine itself. Health workers still have to reach children, trace those who miss doses and get vaccines safely to communities.
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2m shortfall in health. The health funding supported programmes including malaria prevention, maternal and child health, nutrition, family planning and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) services.
The disruption has also raised concerns about the systems that keep routine immunisation running.
?We cannot wait for donors to return’.
A study examining donor withdrawal in northern Ghana found that 75 percent of the districts surveyed reported vaccine delays or irregular supplies. The study also found constraints affecting cold-chain equipment, delivery kits and transport fuel.
Nana Owusu Ensaw, municipal director of health for Akuapim North, said Ghana should use the funding shock to rethink how it pays for healthcare.
John Yabani, the medical director of Banahene Specialist Hospital, said private providers were also prepared to play a larger role.
But private investment cannot immediately replace the public health infrastructure needed to deliver routine vaccinations, particularly in remote communities.
Not everyone sees the loss of donor funding only as a setback.
A government official who spoke to Al Jazeera on condition of anonymity said he had long been uncomfortable with African countries relying on Western governments to finance basic healthcare.
George Kwame Egeh, cofounder and director of operations at the Humserve Africa Foundation, which provides surgical aid and immunisation support to deprived communities, said his organisation had long advocated greater use of local funding.
For immunisation programmes, however, replacing donor money is not simply a matter of finding another funding source. Health workers still have to travel to remote communities, trace children who miss doses, maintain cold-chain equipment and organise outreach services.
?No child should be denied life-saving immunisation’.
In the Oti Region, where many communities are rural, hard to reach and close to Ghana’s borders, the concern is particularly acute.
A 2025 study of routine immunisation in Ghana’s Eastern and Oti regions found basic antigen coverage in Oti of 85. 3 percent, while coverage for the national schedule was 62.
Mark Appiah, chairman of the Oti Regional Health Committee, told Al Jazeera he was concerned that financing pressures could erode those gains.
Appiah said the committee was focusing on domestic resource mobilisation, community participation and targeted support for hard-to-reach communities. He also called for an Oti Regional Health Development and Resource Mobilisation Framework to build structured partnerships with businesses, development partners and NGOs.
For families in communities that can be difficult for health teams to reach, those systems can determine whether a child receives a vaccine or misses a dose.
In northern Ghana, Rahinatu, a mother whose child has benefitted from routine immunisation, said the funding gap had created real challenges for her community.
Her hope comes as Ghana faces a longer-term shift in how it finances vaccines.
Ghana is in an accelerated transition from Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, support and is expected to take full responsibility for financing its immunisation programme from 2030.
At the same time, Gavi is facing its own funding pressures. The alliance’s 2026–2030 strategy aims to strengthen the financial sustainability of immunisation programmes and increase countries’ domestic contributions as they transition from Gavi support.
That puts Ghana under pressure from two directions: the immediate disruption caused by the withdrawal of US funding and the longer-term need to take on a greater share of immunisation costs.
Ghana has begun looking for ways to do that. The government has removed the cap on funding from the National Health Insurance Scheme, while it is also backing efforts to develop local vaccine manufacturing capacity.
As health ministers and senior officials from the World Health Organization (WHO) African Region’s 47 member states meet in Addis Ababa for the 76th session of the WHO Regional Committee for Africa, Ghana’s experience points to a difficult question facing many countries: how quickly can governments build greater financial independence without allowing the health services that children rely on today to weaken.
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