| On Monday I told you about this week’s charitable mission to give a little bit of money away each day to a nonprofit that could really use the help. A little goes a long way and I may not have a lot to give but you all can help. Comment on this post with your ideas for other charities to support so that other readers can get ideas. The top five suggestions will go up in a poll tomorrow for you all to pick who the last $25 goes to (winner announced this weekend). Plus every comment to each day’s post earns the organization another 25 cents in donation (up to a max of $40 for each day’s post – can’t afford more than that guys). And please feel free to go back and comment on posts from past days (I really need more recommendations for Friday’s five picks).
As many of you know, health is a big issue for me. I’ve faced a lot of health challenges. I have also lost some wonderful women in my life to cancer, most importantly my best friend Ashante’s mother, who passed about a month before Pumpkinhead was born. My mother’s cousin, a devoted kindergarten teacher, sister, and friend, is also fighting a hard battle against ovarian cancer and has already lost her father and younger brother to this insidious disease. Finally, my awesome, inspirational classmate, Stephanie, along with my brother, are both fighting the incurable Type I Diabetes, which struck each of them at a very young age and requires daily insulin, constant specialist visits, and other inconvenient and painful life-altering things.
Because I wanted to find a way to support a cause that would help fund cutting edge medical research to help all of my friends and family, I chose the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health. The Foundation for the National Institutes of Health received a four-star rating by Charity Navigator and was ranked the # 1 charity in the medical research category and #1 overall in the health category out of 585 rated charities. The Foundation is ranked #10 among the 5,300 American charities that Charity Navigator rates. Most importantly, of every dollar spent by the foundation, 97 cents is used to support programs, and just 3 cents for administration and fund-raising.
Our Mission
The mission of the Foundation for NIH is to foster public health through scientific discovery, translational research, and the dissemination of research results through specially-configured, high-impact public-private partnerships consistent with the priorities of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
The foundation is not only involved in large, ambitious initiatives with potentially high impact on the lives of millions of the world’s citizens, but it also supports smaller focused programs in clinical training and ancillary support programs.
The foundation helps to underwrite biomedical initiatives that might not be attractive for private funding alone, or for one reason or another are not appropriate for wholly public funding. The foundation may take on projects that are particularly risky in terms of the likelihood of success or where companies may be willing to forgo profits because of early stage nature of the program or in the case of some global health initiatives due to the charitable nature of the project.
The foundation’s projects tend to be longer-term, operating on a time scale that can be unattractive for private investors. At the same time the foundation is capable of responding quickly and nimbly to funding needs that are immediate and pressing.
With the goals of NIH as its guide, the foundation serves both the public and private sectors, helping them achieve significant breakthroughs in human health in areas of interest that overlap with those of NIH.
The Foundation for NIH is involved in nearly 50 public-private partnerships and has raised approximately $350 million since its inception in 1996. In 2003, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced a $200 million grant to the foundation to establish the Grand Challenges in Global Health initiative and in 2005 provided $33 million as part of the Collaboration for AIDS Vaccine Discovery. Other top donors include Pfizer ($35.7 million), Merck ($22.7 million), GlaxoSmithKline ($22.2 million), the Avon Foundation ($9.4 million), and Novartis ($8.3 million). These days, the foundation receives between $70 million and $100 million in revenues per year.
The Foundation for NIH is a leader in the creation of specially-configured public-private biomedical research partnerships and is now the world’s leading foundation for biomedical public-private partnerships.
During 2006, the foundation spent $56 million on program services. For every dollar spent by the foundation, 94 cents is used to support research programs, 2 cents to support other types of programs (fellowships, events, lectures, and events) and just 2 cents to pay for administration and fund-raising.
Please leave a comment to help earn this charity additional donations and also tell me who you would have me support in tomorrow’s reader selection. I will put out five charities and you choose the winner.
P.S. Don’t forget to go over to Pseudostoops’ blog and comment there to help out some of the awesome charities she is supporting!
