Governments, donors, multilateral institutions, and partners today announced major new policy, programmatic and financial commitments, including nearly US$ 600 million in new funding, to eliminate cervical cancer. If these ambitions to expand vaccine coverage and strengthen screening and treatment programs are fully realized, the world could eliminate a cancer for the first time.

These commitments were made at the first-ever Global Cervical Cancer Elimination Forum: Advancing the Call to Action in Cartagena de Indias, Colombia, to catalyse national and global momentum to end this preventable disease.

Every two minutes, a woman dies from cervical cancer, although the knowledge and the tools to prevent and even eliminate this disease already exist. Vaccination against human papillomavirus (HPV) – the leading cause of cervical cancer – can prevent the vast majority of cases and, combined with screening and treatment, provides a path to elimination. 

Cervical cancer is the fourth most common cancer in women worldwide, and continues to disproportionately impact women and their families in low and middle-income countries (LMICs). In an important shift, the World Health Organization (WHO)’s 2022 global recommendation for one-dose HPV vaccine schedules significantly reduced barriers to scaling up vaccination programs. It was reinforced by a similar recommendation in the Americas Region in 2023. The WHO’s Regional Office for Africa has just followed suit with its own recommendation for countries in the region to adopt the single-dose vaccination schedule. To date, 37 countries have reported switching or intent to switch to a one-dose regimen. 

The commitments announced at the forum mark a watershed moment to accelerate progress on a promise made in 2020, when 194 countries adopted WHO’s global strategy to eliminate cervical cancer.