World Pneumonia Day: Vaccines4Children, the alliance promoting the vaccination of 13 million children in Africa

Pneumonia is still the leading cause of child mortality from infection worldwide. World Pneumonia Day is observed every 12 November to raise awareness of its causes and highlight the importance of immunisation.

In 2025, around 13.5 million children received no vaccines during their first year of life, according to the World Health Organization (WHO) and UNICEF. Among the most important immunisations is the pneumococcal vaccine, which plays a key role in preventing pneumonia, a disease that remains the leading cause of child mortality from infection among children under five. World Pneumonia Day is observed every year on 12 November to raise awareness of its causes and highlight the importance of immunisation.

In response to this situation, 18 years ago the ”la Caixa” Foundation and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, with the support of the Gates Foundation, launched Vaccines4Children. This alliance helps children living in vulnerable situations in Africa gain access to vaccines against pneumonia. Since its launch in 2008, this solidarity initiative has raised more than 100 million euros, which has been used to support the immunisation of more than 13 million children against both pneumonia and malaria.

A pioneering philanthropic initiative

Vaccines4Children is a pioneering initiative in Europe, thanks to its model of philanthropic collaboration and mobilisation of private resources. The alliance raises funds through donations from companies across Spain as part of their corporate social responsibility programmes, as well as through contributions from individuals.

These donations are then quadrupled through a matching fund model. For every euro donated, the ”la Caixa” Foundation contributes an additional euro, up to a maximum of three million euros per year, while the Gates Foundation adds a further two euros. In this way, every single euro donated is transformed into four euros dedicated to supporting vaccination programmes in Africa, with a particular focus on Mozambique and Ethiopia and with priority being given to access to vaccines against pneumonia and malaria.

The model is one of the most significant philanthropic collaboration and private fundraising initiatives in the field of global health in Europe. The alliance also contributes to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) established by the United Nations as part of the 2030 Agenda, a plan of action for people, the planet and prosperity.

Throughout this process, the ”la Caixa” Foundation is involved in monitoring the project and ensures that all contributions are allocated in their entirety to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, to support childhood vaccination. The Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), a centre supported by the ”la Caixa” Foundation, joined the alliance as a strategic partner in 2014, contributing its scientific and academic expertise to the project.

Over the past seven years, the funds raised through the Vaccines4Children initiative have fully funded pneumonia vaccination programmes in Mozambique. In 2025, the initiative also provided for childhood vaccination against malaria in the country.

Tackling child mortality

The ”la Caixa” Foundation, which became the first private-sector partner in Europe of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance in 2008, renewed its commitment to the organisation and to Vaccines4Children in 2026 for the eighteenth consecutive year.

A distinctive feature of this initiative, launched by the ”la Caixa” Foundation, is the involvement of CaixaBank customers. On the one hand, companies across Spain make contributions as part of a corporate social responsibility project that is pioneering in Europe; on the other, individual customers also contribute to the Vaccines4Children alliance. The initiative is supported by the CaixaBank Empresas, CaixaBank Wealth Management and CaixaBank Corporate & Investment Banking teams, as well as by the bank’s entire branch network, whose involvement is key to raising awareness of the initiative and ensuring its success.

With this aim, CaixaBank Empresas works to raise awareness among its customers, offering them the opportunity to help improve access to and the quality of vaccines in developing countries as a social responsibility initiative that enables them to give back to society some of what they have received from it. CaixaBank Wealth Management, meanwhile, promotes support for Gavi through its Social Value Project, which fosters and encourages its customers’ philanthropic goals.

Improving access to vaccination

Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, is a public-private partnership that brings together developing countries and donors, including governments, the World Health Organization, UNICEF, the World Bank, the vaccine industry, technical agencies, civil society, the Gates Foundation and other private-sector partners, including the ”la Caixa” Foundation.

Since its creation in 2000, its mission has been to save lives, reduce poverty and protect the world against the threat of epidemics and pandemics. To this end, it has helped vaccinate more than 1.3 billion children across 78 countries, thereby preventing 23 million premature deaths between 2000 and 2025.

The ”la Caixa” Foundation, over a century of building a better world

Providing opportunities for those who need them most, with the aim of helping to build a fairer and more equitable society, has been the raison d’être of the ”la Caixa” Foundation since it was established in 1904. Today, it is Spain’s leading private foundation and one of the most prominent internationally. The priority of the ”la Caixa” Foundation is to develop social programmes that address the major challenges of our time, such as promoting employment among people facing barriers to work, tackling child poverty, caring for people with advanced illnesses and promoting active and healthy ageing. Medical research, excellence in education, culture and training – all essential to driving progress and equal opportunities – are other strategic areas of activity for the Foundation.