San Salvador, September 26th, 2025. – The Ministry of Health and the Pan American Health Organization/World Health Organization (PAHO/WHO), signed an agreement that formalizes El Salvador's participation in the Global Platform for Access to Childhood Cancer Medicines (Global Platform), an initiative aimed at ensuring a sustainable and equitable supply of essential medicines for children with cancer.
The Global Platform, funded by St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital (St. Jude), was conceived in 2021 by St. Jude and WHO, in collaboration with UNICEF and PAHO Strategic Fund. At present, it is working with twelve participating countries and delivering medicines to five of these countries. Its participatory design addresses the local needs of each country, ensuring access to quality-assured pediatric cancer medications and a continuous supply.
El Salvador was selected as the second country in the Americas to join the pilot phase of the initiative, in recognition of the country’s leadership in setting the childhood cancer agenda, reflected in the adoption of the National Childhood Cancer Plan 2021–2025 and the establishment of mechanisms for early detection and treatment adherence.
As part of this process, the Ministry of Health has established a National Subcommittee, comprising technical teams from various areas to facilitate the implementation of the Global Platform in the country and ensure coordination among planning, logistics, and medication management.
The inclusion of El Salvador in the Global Platform represents a decisive step toward consolidating progress in the fight against childhood cancer, strengthening comprehensive care, access to quality treatments, and regional cooperation. Additionally, it will facilitate the adoption of protocols and international best practices, while contributing to the development of national capacities to ensure the sustainability of the health system.
El Salvador became a focus country of the Global Initiative for Childhood Cancer in 2021. Since then, technical cooperation in the country has allowed the development of a framework that includes training healthcare personnel, strengthening cancer registries, and creating educational materials for patients and families. With this new phase, these efforts will be expanded by incorporating mechanisms that facilitate access to medications and updated protocols for the treatment of childhood cancer.
With the signing of this agreement, the Ministry of Health and PAHO/WHO are advancing in strengthening the national response to childhood cancer, with the goal of ensuring comprehensive and equitable care for Salvadoran children.
About the Global Platform
The Global Platform for Access to Childhood Cancer Medicines (Global Platform) was conceived in 2021 by St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and WHO, which jointly developed the initiative to complement the Global Initiative for Childhood Cancer, in collaboration with UNICEF and the Pan American Health Organization Strategic Fund as procurement agents. The Global Platform aims to provide an uninterrupted supply of quality-assured cancer medicines to approximately 120 000 children in low- and middle-income countries in the next five to seven years, with the expectation of scaling up supplies in future years. The Global Platform provides end-to-end support in consolidating global demand to shape the market, and assists countries with the selection of medicines, development of treatment standards and the building of information systems to track that effective care is being provided.
At present, the Global Platform is working with 12 participating countries: Ecuador, El Salvador, Ghana, Jordan, Moldova, Mongolia, Nepal, Pakistan, Senegal, Sri Lanka, Uzbekistan, and Zambia.
