Evidence Action
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| Predecessor | Deworm the World |
|---|---|
| Formation | 2013 |
| Founder | Amrita Ahuja |
| Legal status | 501(c)3 |
| Headquarters | Washington, DC |
Region | Sub-Saharan Africa South Asia East Africa |
| Fields | International development Global health |
CEO | Kanika Bahl |
| Shikhar Ghosh (Chair) Amrita Ahuja Kanika Bahl Elizabeth Young McNally Christina Reichers Dina Pomeranz Owens Wiwa | |
Key people | Michael Kremer Esther Duflo Rachel Glennerster Kristin Forbes |
Revenue (2021) | $22 Million USD |
| Expenses (2021) | $22.4 Million USD |
Staff (2023) | 700+ |
| Website | https://www.evidenceaction.org/ |
Evidence Action is an American non-profit organization founded in 2013 that scales cost-effective development interventions with rigorous evidence supporting their efficacy.[1] The organization operates four main programs: the Deworm the World Initiative, Safe Water Now, Equal Vitamin Access, and Syphilis-Free Start.
History
Evidence Action was founded in 2013 as the parent organization for the Deworm the World Initiative, an international deworming campaign co-founded by economists Kristin Forbes, Michael Kremer, Esther Duflo, and Rachel Glennerster.[2] In 2004, Kremer and co-author Edward Miguel published an impact evaluation of a school-based deworming campaign in Kenya, showing that the program increased school attendance rates by 25% and improved overall health.[3] Kremer and Esther Duflo presented the findings of this and other research at the World Economic Forum in 2007, founding the Deworm the World Initiative as an independent organization.[4] From 2010 to 2014, Deworm the World was incubated by Innovations for Poverty Action, a non-profit research and policy organization advocating for the use of rigorous impact evaluation in international development.[4]
In 2013, Evidence Action was founded to manage Deworm the World. Alix Zwane, Evidence Action's first executive director,[5] articulated the organization's mandate as being based on the "gap between what research shows is effective in global development and what is implemented in practice."[6] The organization is now run by Kanika Bahl, a former Executive Vice President of the Clinton Health Access Initiative.[7][8] From 2013 to 2022, Evidence Action was ranked a top-rated charity by GiveWell, considered among the best internationally for social impact per dollar spent.[9]
Programs
Evidence Action operates four distinct programs: Deworm the World, Safe Water Now, Equal Vitamin Access, and Syphilis-Free Start. The first two of these were incubated by Innovations for Poverty Action, and are implemented at-scale.[10] The latter two were launched via Evidence Action's accelerator program, whereby promising interventions are piloted and scaled conditional on performance.
Deworm the World
Evidence Action's flagship program is Deworm the World, a school-based deworming scheme active in Kenya, India, Nigeria, and Pakistan. The Deworm the World Initiative was founded in 2007, in response to an experimental evaluation of a school-based deworming campaign in Busia, Kenya. After completing his undergraduate degree at Harvard University, Michael Kremer spent a year as a teacher and administrator at Eshisiru Secondary School in the Kakamega District of Kenya. He returned to the area on vacation with his wife Rachel Glennerster after completing his PhD, where he learned of a friend's plan to roll-out deworming medications in local schools. He was inspired to conduct a randomized controlled trial of the scheme, rolling out treatments in 1998, and in 2004 publishing the results of the study in Econometrica alongside Edward Miguel, his co-author and PhD student.
The results of the study indicated that deworming is a cost effective means of improving health and education outcomes, raising school attendance rates by 25%. Results from the experiment were presented by Kremer and Esther Duflo at the World Economic Forum in 2007, inspiring the [[
Safe Water Now
Evidence Action also operates a point-of-collection water chlorination program called "Safe Water Now". The scheme was incubated by Innovations for Poverty Action, and was founded in response to a randomized controlled trial of a similar chlorination program conducted by Johannes Haushofer, Michael Kremer, Ricardo Maertens, and Brandon Joel Tan in Kenya.[11] The RCT found that distribution of chlorine solution reduced infant (i.e. under five) mortality in sampled villages by 1.4 percentage points, a 63% decline from baseline.[11][12] The program was found to significantly exceed World Health Organization cost effectiveness standards, and was identified by Evidence Action as a scalable, low cost, and high impact intervention, saving lives for an estimated $1,941.[12]
As of mid-2019, Safe Water Now provided chlorination services to 4 million people,[13] a number that has grown to over 10 million in 2023.[14]
Syphillis-Free Start
Evidence Action also operates two additional programs, launched through its venture capital Accelerator program. One of these, Syphillis-Free Start, aims to expand testing for syphilis in pregnant women, a cause of birth complications and childhood disability. Syphillis testing costs $0.35
No Lean Season
References
- ^ "Using evidence to improve global well being". Evidence Action. Retrieved 2023-11-21.
- ^ "Deworming the world". MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 2010-05-27. Retrieved 2023-11-21.
- ^ Miguel, Edward; Kremer, Michael (January 2004). "Worms: Identifying Impacts on Education and Health in the Presence of Treatment Externalities". Econometrica. 72 (1): 159–217. doi:10.1111/j.1468-0262.2004.00481.x. ISSN 0012-9682.
- ^ a b "School-Based Deworming | IPA". poverty-action.org. Retrieved 2023-11-21.
- ^ "Alix Peterson Zwane". Global Innovation Fund. Retrieved 2023-11-21.
- ^ Zhang, Zara (2015-07-02). "Doing Good Scientifically". Harvard Magazine. Retrieved 2023-11-21.
- ^ McDonough, Siobhan (2022-10-20). "Kanika Bahl is finding the unicorns of international development". Vox. Retrieved 2023-11-21.
- ^ "Kanika Bahl". Evidence Action. Retrieved 2023-11-21.
- ^ "Evidence Action's Deworm the World Initiative – August 2022 version | GiveWell". www.givewell.org. Retrieved 2023-11-21.
- ^ "Evidence Action | InfoNTD". www.infontd.org. Retrieved 2023-11-21.
- ^ a b Haushofer, Johannes; Kremer, Michael; Maertens, Ricardo; Tan, Brandon Joel (November 2021). Water Treatment and Child Mortality: Evidence from Kenya (Report). Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.
- ^ a b Matthews, Dylan (2021-11-13). "How a simple solution slashed child mortality in rural Kenyan villages". Vox. Retrieved 2023-11-27.
- ^ "Chlorine Dispensers for Safe Water | IPA". poverty-action.org. Retrieved 2023-11-27.
- ^ "Safe Water Now". Evidence Action. Retrieved 2023-11-27.