On June 25, 2014, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Governments of Ethiopia and India, in collaboration with UNICEF and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, came together for a high-level forum called Acting on the Call: Ending Preventable Child and Maternal Deaths to celebrate progress, assess the challenges that remain and identify the steps needed to sustain momentum in the future.

At this event, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) announced  that it would realign $2.9 billion of the Agency’s resources to save up to half a million children from preventable deaths by the end of 2015—refocusing resources on high-impact programs with proven track records to save the most lives.

USAID also released a transparent action plan that reveals how the Agency, working with the global community, will prioritize results for the most at-risk families in the most vulnerable countries. USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah announced these goals, along with more than $600 million in new public/private partnerships and awards with 26 partners and representatives from the governments of all 24 priority countries.