Non-issue specific SRH funding

Overview

This area includes SRH-relevant funding that cannot be allocated to a specific SRH condition. Non-issue-specific (NIS) funding in SRH plays a critical and often underappreciated role in driving innovation and strengthening the overall research ecosystem. Rather than being tied to a single disease or condition, this type of funding supports foundational elements that span across multiple areas of SRH.

One key component is core funding—unearmarked support given to organisations working across a range of SRH priorities. This flexible funding enables institutions to respond nimbly to evolving health needs, explore cross-cutting solutions, and sustain critical infrastructure without being constrained by disease-specific allocations.

Another important strand is investment in platform technologies. These are versatile tools and approaches, such as vaccine platforms, drug delivery systems, and diagnostic frameworks, that can be applied across a range of diseases or health conditions. Though not targeted at a single SRH challenge from the outset, platform technologies offer enormous potential to accelerate R&D and improve responsiveness to emerging threats.

In addition, there is the category of ‘Other R&D’ includes funding for initiatives that cut across multiple SRH issues or disease areas, particularly where it is not feasible to attribute funding to individual conditions. This type of support enables interdisciplinary research and collaborative approaches that reflect the interconnected nature of sexual and reproductive health.

Taken together, these streams of non-issue-specific funding are essential to fostering resilience, enabling systems-wide improvements, and unlocking scalable solutions across the SRH landscape

Funding

Global R&D funding targeting more than one SRH issue (‘non-issue-specific’, or ‘NIS’ funding) maintained its upward trend, growing more than sixfold from its 2018 level to hit a record $202m in 2023. This increase has been driven largely by steady growth in funding for SRH-applicable platform technologies, which account for almost 70% of NIS funding. As with overall NIS spending, platform funding has risen more than sixfold since 2018, reaching a total of $170m in 2023.

Remaining NIS funding was divided between SRH-relevant core funding to multi-disease organisations like the Barcelona Institute for Global Health ($43m, 18% of the 2023 total – and up $12m from 2022), core funding of SRH R&D organisations ($11m, 4%, up by $1.6m) and a range of hard-to-categorise ‘Other R&D’ ($21m, 9%, up $8.2m).

The vast majority of NIS funding came via grants which we judged as being relevant to all three of the global health areas we cover: neglected disease and emerging infectious disease alongside SRH/women’s health. This included 95% of platform funding, 80% of core funding and 68% of Other R&D. After accounting for funding directed to either SRH and emerging infectious disease, or to SRH and neglected disease, only $13m (5%) of 2023 NIS funding was specifically directed to sexual & reproductive health – a figure that has remained largely unchanged since 2018.

Funding for SRH-applicable platform technologies grew for the fifth year in a row, reaching an all-time high of $139m in 2023, with much of the funding seemingly intended for use against emerging infectious diseases. Almost half of the platform funding in 2023 went to vaccine related platform technologies ($79m, 46%) with most of the remainder split fairly evenly between drug-related platforms ($24m, 14%), adjuvants & immunomodulators ($27m, 16%), and general diagnostic platforms ($31m, 18%). The relatively new category of biologics-related platforms received the remaining $9m – just 5% of total platform funding.

The Gates Foundation continued to dominate the platform funding landscape, following a modest increase in 2023 (up $25m, 34%). This left it responsible for more than half of 2023’s SRH-relevant platform technology funding ($98m, 58%) with a strong focus on vaccine platforms, which accounted for almost two-thirds of its platform funding. The Gates Foundation’s concentration on vaccine platforms left it responsible for almost 80% of global funding in this area.

Core funding specifically for SRH R&D organisations totalled $11m in 2023, following a marginal increase from previous year (up $1.6m, 17%). This was the second straight year of funding growth and was attributable to two funders: the Indian ICMR, which provided $7.9m in self-funding; and the US NIH, which provided a record $3.0m.

Core funding to multi-disease organisations rose by 38% to $43m (up $12m), now up fourfold from 2020’s record low. This growth mostly reflects a new line of funding, beginning in 2022, from the Czech Republic Ministry of Education to the Czech Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry, which totalled $35m in the two years since it began, all of which is relevant to, but likely not intended for, SRH conditions.

Funding for SRH-related ‘Other R&D’ rose by 65% ($8.2m) in 2023 to reach $21m, after three years of relative stasis, thanks to increased contributions from the two largest funders: the Gates Foundation (up $4.3m, 206%) and the US NIH (up $1.8m, 41%). The EC also contributed $0.7m for a home vaginal microbiome screening kit with potential applications to SRH indications including STIs. Wellcome provided its first ever funding for Other R&D in 2023, which went to the University of Oxford to support LMIC-based SRH-related activities across several different areas.