| When humans began to be infected with highly pathogenic avian influenza and the disease began infecting poultry in greater numbers in 2004 and 2005, fear spread rapidly around the globe. The world had not been subject to a human pandemic influenza since the late 1960s, and the H5N1 strain that had infected a few people appeared to be as virulent as the Spanish Influenza of 1918, which ultimately killed more than 50 million people.
The World Bank, along with the World Health Organization, Food and Agriculture Organization, and World Organization for Animal Health, helped to quickly convene major global partners around a strategy for action, and to raise over $1.8 billion in pledges from donor countries at a January 2006 conference in Beijing. Important ingredients in the Bank's advocacy on the issue include robust economic analysis, convening power, fiduciary reputation, and multi-sectoral expertise and orientation.
The Bank's direct contributions on the ground in partner countries have been more of a mixed bag. Aside from a few large projects in Turkey, Romania, and Nigeria, Bank-supported projects have been small, and disbursements slow. And some vulnerable areas, including much of sub-Saharan Africa, have made little progress. This is in part because the multi-donor trust fund was spread too thin across too many countries.
But where counterparts do see value and take ownership, and the Bank helps implement a program, it has brought to bear its expertise and convening power. The large project in Nigeria, for example, was initially hampered by a lack of coordination among Federal ministries. The Bank has helped to overcome these boundaries, mediate among agencies, and suggested a new implementation structure that has worked extremely well.
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