New initiative will identify high-impact innovations with great potential to accelerate progress on urgent health challenges
Contact:
Kate Cheney Davidson, PATH, kdavidson@path.org, (o) 206-302-4637, (m) 510-326-4451.
New York, September 24, 2014–The new Innovation Countdown 2030 initiative announced today will identify and showcase lifesaving health technologies and interventions with high potential to transform global health over the next 15 years and beyond.
By engaging entrepreneurs, investors, innovators, and experts from around the world, the initiative aims to fast-track the discovery and development of game-changing innovations to improve health and save lives.
"Innovation has already transformed global efforts to improve health since the launch of the Millennium Development Goals in 2000," said Steve Davis, PATH president and CEO. "How many more lives could we save over the next 15 years if we could identify and accelerate the next generation of health innovations? Innovation Countdown 2030 harnesses the power of innovation to reimagine what is possible in global health."
As the United Nations develops the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and related health targets, the initiative will build on the momentum generated since 2000 by focusing the collective expertise, resources, networks, and commitment of the world's leading innovators on the most promising health innovations. The Innovation Countdown 2030 initiative will identify and assess innovations with the potential to "bend the curve" of progress in human health and help us reach the new SDG health targets.
Funded by the Norwegian Development Agency (Norad), the initiative is being led by PATH in close collaboration with thought leaders and experts in innovation and research. The initiative was announced at the Transformative Innovation for Health forum sponsored by the Financial Times and PATH in New York.
Survey seeks high-potential innovations
Innovation Countdown 2030 seeks to identify innovations with great promise to:
- Reduce maternal deaths and end preventable deaths of newborns and children under age five.
- Ensure universal access to reproductive health supplies and services.
- End the epidemics of AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, and neglected tropical diseases and combat other infectious diseases.
- Reduce the toll of diabetes, cancer, and chronic respiratory and cardiovascular disease.
To identify innovations with great potential for health impact by 2030, PATH is conducting a survey to gather innovations identified by a range of multidisciplinary experts in global health, technology, investment, the nonprofit sector, academia, and government from around the world.
The public is invited to participate in the survey, available at: www.ic2030.org/engage/.
Survey responses received by October 10, 2014, will be evaluated using an assessment methodology developed with the input and guidance of an independent expert advisory group. An independent panel of experts will rank selected innovations, taking into account their potential for impact based on their affordability, accessibility, effectiveness, and other factors.
The Innovation Countdown 2030 report
A set of 20 to 30 high-potential health innovations will be featured in the Innovation Countdown 2030 report planned for release in 2015. The report aims to catalyze investment and increase support for technologies and interventions with great promise for accelerating progress toward the SDG health targets.
Survey responses received after October 10, 2014, will be part of a pool of innovations considered for future editions of the report.
To learn more about Innovation Countdown 2030, please visit: www.ic2030.org.
About Norad
The Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (Norad) was established in 1962 and is part of the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Its main objectives are to make Norwegian development aid as effective as possible, to ensure that funds are spent in the best possible way, and to report on what is and is not successful. Norad provides expert advice about development and aid to the Foreign Service and works together with a range of other players in development assistance. In 2012, Norad managed 12 percent of the NOK28 billion that Norway provided in development assistance. Learn more: http://www.norad.no/en/front-page