Bloomberg pledges $350 million more to cut road deaths in 13 countries

On 28 April 2026, at the CityLab summit in Madrid that his foundation co-hosts with the Aspen Institute, Michael Bloomberg announced a new $350 million commitment to the Bloomberg Philanthropies Initiative for Global Road Safety, which also includes a programme to build cycling infrastructure. The next phase runs from 2026 to 2030 and covers 13 countries and more than 30 cities, among them Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, Guayaquil, Nairobi, Hanoi, Kuala Lumpur and Kampala. Its stated goal is to save one million more lives over five years.

Road crashes kill more than a million people a year, according to the World Health Organization, and injure tens of millions more; young people aged 5 to 29 are hit hardest, and most deaths occur in low- and middle-income countries. Since the initiative began in 2007, it says it has helped governments pass 190 national, state and city laws and policies that cover about 4.2 billion people and has saved close to 900,000 lives. The work concentrates on proven measures: stronger laws on speeding, drink-driving, helmets and seat belts, better crash data, police enforcement, safer street design and safer vehicles. The new money brings the foundation's total investment in road safety to about $865 million.

In practice much of the funding pays for technical help to city governments. Kampala's city authority, which joined in 2020, said it will receive support with crash data, safer road design, traffic enforcement, public awareness campaigns and safety audits of new and existing roads, and plans to add pavements, road markings and street lighting with a focus on pedestrians and cyclists. Reported road deaths in the Ugandan capital fell slightly, from 411 in 2023 to 404 in 2024.

Bloomberg, who was raised in a Jewish family in Medford, Massachusetts, founded the Bloomberg L.P. financial data company and served three terms as mayor of New York.