Adequate and Sustained Financing for NCDs and Mental Health: Approaches to Closing the Implementation Gap

The Fourth UN High-Level Meeting on Noncommunicable Diseases and Mental Health (HLM4) in 2025 marked a critical moment for governments to recommit to NCD action. Its Political Declaration reaffirmed global commitments to prevent and control the world’s leading causes of death while underscoring persistent implementation gaps: insufficient financing for NCD prevention and care and mental health promotion is limiting countries’ progress.

While domestic financing must be the backbone of NCD and mental health responses, catalytic development assistance, including through pooled funding such as the UN Health4Life Fund, could play a critical role. To address the Declaration’s commitments to mobilising adequate and sustained financing, this side event will showcase solutions, including health taxes, strategic deployment of development aid, debt-for-health swaps, regional or South-South collaborations, such as to strengthen regional pharmaceutical manufacturing, and opportunities for countries to accelerate its implementation.

The session is timely ahead of the third Global NCD and Mental Health Financing Dialogue in Manila (September 2026) and will help align NCD and mental health financing strategies with WHO's Fourteenth General Programme of Work and broader discussions on global health architecture. The event will highlight how governments and other stakeholders can coordinate and mobilise resources to translate global commitments into action and tangible health impact by showcasing successful financing mechanisms.

The event takes place on 19 May, at 13:00-14:20 CEST.  To attend this event, an access badge to enter the WHO HQ premises is required.

This is an official WHA79 event organised by the Government of Barbados, NCD Alliance, and United for Global Mental Health with the Government of the Philippines, UNDP, the UN Inter-Agency Task Force on NCDs and Healthy Caribbean Coalition.

Watch this space for the list of confirmed speakers.