Pandemic preparedness slipping as global risks grow, new 100 Days Mission report warns
Fragile systems, uneven investment and pipeline stagnation threaten the world’s ability to respond to another pandemic within 100 days.
By READDI, January 27, 2026 — Global pandemic readiness is becoming increasingly fragile at a time of growing biosecurity and geopolitical risk. That’s the key takeaway from the Fifth Implementation Report of the 100 Days Mission, released today by the International Pandemic Preparedness Secretariat (IPPS) during an international event in Paris.
Other key points from the report:
- The 100-day target is not yet achievable in many areas, with significant gaps persisting across diagnostics, therapeutics, vaccines and the systems required to deliver them rapidly and equitably.
- A series of outbreaks in 2025, including mpox, H5N1, Ebola, Marburg, Rift Valley Fever, Chikungunya and measles, demonstrated persistent weaknesses in early detection, coordination and access.
- The 100DM Scorecard 3.0 highlights continued pressure on global R&D pipelines, declining investment in pandemic countermeasures and heavy reliance on a small number of funders.
- Major reductions in global health and research budgets in 2025 have exposed structural vulnerabilities, disrupted development pipelines and weakened preparedness.
READDI is a core implementation partner in the 100 Days Mission, which was established in 2021 by the world’s G7 leaders to ensure the global availability of diagnostics, therapeutics and vaccines within the first 100 days of a pandemic threat. The Fifth Implementation Report assesses global progress toward this ambition during a year of major political, financial and epidemiological change.
I am hopeful the work READDI and its 100 Days Mission partners have put into building the Therapeutics Development Coalition will convince global funders to invest in sustained therapeutics R&D to make the world safer and more economically secure.”
In 2025, the adoption of the WHO Pandemic Agreement marked a significant step forward, establishing the first global framework for equitable preparedness and response. However, the report finds that implementation now represents the decisive test. At the same time, sharp contractions in global health and R&D funding, including reduced commitments from major donors and the closure of several large programs, have disrupted pipelines and revealed how dependent the preparedness ecosystem remains on a narrow funding base.
“The IPPS’s latest 100 Days Mission Implementation Report provides further proof that pandemic preparedness is a funding problem, not a science problem,” says READDI CEO Jimmy Rosen. “Considering the millions of deaths and more than $16 trillion in global economic losses caused by COVID-19, the case for investing in medical countermeasures is indisputable.”
The 100DM Scorecard 3.0, developed in collaboration with Impact Global Health, shows that overall investment in pandemic countermeasure R&D continued to decline through FY2024, with the steepest impacts seen in therapeutics. Pipelines across diagnostics, therapeutics and vaccines remain uneven and clustered in early stages, with limited progression into mid-stage and late-stage development. Progress on enabling systems, including regulatory preparedness, clinical trial readiness, data-sharing frameworks and manufacturing coordination, remains slow.
A succession of outbreaks in 2025 reinforced these findings. Mpox remains a continental health emergency in Africa; H5N1 has demonstrated zoonotic spillover risk; and outbreaks of Ebola, Marburg, Rift Valley Fever and Chikungunya have placed renewed pressure on public health systems.
The report identifies four priority action areas for 2026:
- Operationalizing the Therapeutics Development Coalition, which READDI helped create, to address persistent gaps in antiviral R&D.
- Enhancing coordination across the diagnostics ecosystem and implementing recommendations from the Global Diagnostics Gap Assessment.
- Sustaining vaccine investment and strengthening alignment across diagnostics, therapeutics and vaccines.
- Agreeing on a sustainable mechanism for pandemic preparedness monitoring, including a long-term path for the 100 Days Mission Scorecard beyond the IPPS mandate.
“I am hopeful the work READDI and its 100 Days Mission partners have put into building the Therapeutics Development Coalition will convince global funders to invest in sustained therapeutics R&D to make the world safer and more economically secure,” Rosen says.