Ireland is to quadruple its funding to the World Health Organisation this year.
Tánaiste Simon Coveney made the announcement this morning.
He says the state will donate €9.5 million to help with the global response to Covid-19.
#Ireland strongly supports @WHO in efforts to coordinate a global response to combat #COVID19. So many countries rely on @UN expertise and capacity to save lives. Ireland is quadrupling our normal annual financial contribution to @WHO for 2020 to €9.5 million.
— Simon Coveney (@simoncoveney) April 16, 2020
The announcement comes just days after US President Donald Trump said his country's contribution to the Organisation would be stopped.
Last year, the United States gave around $400 million to the WHO.
The Organisation said it would work with its other partners to fill any financial gap left by the United States.
Following that, the Gates Foundation has revealed it has committed an additional $150 million to the WHO.
Today we are committing an additional $150 million to our overall #COVID-19 response bringing our total commitment to more than $250 million. Our CEO @MSuzman shares more on our approach. https://t.co/6k42zbPw87
— Gates Foundation (@gatesfoundation) April 15, 2020
