Record vaccine drive immunises 73 million children and prevents 2.2 million deaths

Gavi says its 2025 programmes delivered their biggest reach yet, generating more than US$30 billion in economic benefits while millions of children worldwide remained unvaccinated.

Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance says it helped immunise a record 73 million children in 2025, a milestone that it says prevented more than 2.2 million deaths and comfortably exceeded its five-year target for lives saved. The alliance’s annual progress report also says the vaccines it supported generated more than US$30 billion in economic benefits for lower-income countries, underlining the extent to which immunisation programmes can pay off in both health and financial terms.

The scale of the result matters because global vaccine coverage still leaves too many children behind. The World Health Organization says 85% of infants worldwide received the full three-dose diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis series in 2025, while 13.5 million children received no vaccines at all. WHO and UNICEF said in July that 14.3 million infants remained “zero-dose” in 2024, showing how far there still is to go even after years of progress.

Gavi says its own partners have helped narrow that gap. In its annual report, the alliance said countries it supports pushed DTP3 coverage to 82%, the highest level yet for the group, and that its programmes reached more than 300 million children during the 2021-25 strategic period. Those gains come at a time when vaccine campaigns face persistent logistical, political and funding pressures, particularly in lower-income countries where outbreaks can spread quickly and routine care is often fragile.

The alliance’s 2025 figures also arrive against a broader reminder of how uneven global health progress remains. While the world still has millions of children missing routine vaccines, Gavi’s latest numbers suggest sustained financing and delivery can still produce large, measurable gains. The alliance’s message is straightforward: immunisation remains one of the clearest examples of public health spending that saves lives, strengthens economies and narrows inequality at the same time.