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Dr. Shaun Morris is an Infectious Diseases Consultant at The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, one of the largest and most respected paediatric academic health science centres in the world. He is an innovator in the Stars in Global Health (Round 4) program with a project called 'A toolkit to save newborn lives', implemented in Pakistan. Grand Challenges Canada is innovative in many ways, including the requirements of grant proposals.  As part of the Stars in Global applicants submit a short video outlining their proposed idea to solve a global health problem.   The problem I chose to tackle is that of newborn mortality.  While significant progress has been made over the past decade on overall mortality with children under the age of five, minimal progress has been made in reducing neonatal deaths…have a mutual goal of improving maternal and infant health in the poorest parts of the world. Several months after our initial contact, Baby Hero is now up and running and the neonatal kits are soon to roll out in Rahimyar Khan District in Punjab, Pakistan.   Our goal with the kits is to reduce neonatal…

…gingerly slid on a paper clip sans creases. From the way I was beaming you’d think I had just printed a thesis. Instead, I held crisp cheques for Grand Challenges Canada’s travel agent, ready for a signature.     Let’s step back and consider that accomplishing even routine tasks at Grand Challenges Canada helps our team support innovators and their bold ideas — ideas that incite audible “wows” in staff meetings. That’s the real story, and the source of my exaggerated proud moment. Printing my first check as a Business Analysis summer student felt like I was doing my part to “pay the bills around here,” a main task of the Finance Team. When someone can say, “I pay the bills around here,” it’s a pretty good indication…

Freweini Mabrahtu remembers her first period growing up in Northern Ethiopia. She didn’t understand what was happening to her body and worried about telling anyone out of fear and shame. She lacked access to sanitary products and used old cloths and other unhygienic materials in their place. Sometimes she missed class from embarrassment. Like many adolescent …uninformed about menstruation. Freweini’s story also illustrates the distinct challenges faced by millions of girls in low- and middle- income countries in managing their menses. It is for this reason that Freweini returned home after ten years of studying and working in the United States to launch a social enterprise that produces affordable, high-quality, reusable…subject to luxury sales tax, as opposed to items like adult diapers and Rogaine that are not. Canada’s own “tampon tax” was only repealed last summer after significant lobbying efforts. Clearly, MHM is a multi-faceted issue that encompasses more than access to menstrual products. At the heart of MHM is an entry point to engage…

In a desperate bid to get to a hospital, a young woman dies a lonely death in a taxi just before giving birth. She has neither the money nor support to reach medical help in time. Sadly, such needless losses occur too often in remote and disadvantaged parts of the world. Impediments to the well-being of mothers-to-be lie…mobilization in the event of childbirths, innovators at Kenya’s Moi University School of Medicine now aim to stimulate pro-activity across all community levels to assist and care for their mothers and infants. The solution to the challenge, according to the team, lies within the inherent strength and existing networks of the community itself. “In our…have a sustainable community-driven solution in maternal and newborn health.” At the heart of this solution is a Mother-Baby Health Network to enable quality service delivery, and promote demand creation. In a part of the world where cell phone are pervasive, it’s a high-tech solution to the age-old issue of maternal health. The team plans…

…Toronto, and completed post-doctoral training at the Department of Immunology at the University of Toronto.  Her work focuses on understanding the molecular basis of the host response to pathogens in an effort to develop novel and innovative therapeutic approached to diseases of global health importance.  On World Malaria Day I would like to celebrate the successes of the global efforts to control and eliminate malaria that have significantly reduced malaria mortality worldwide.  I would also like to note that despite all these great efforts, well over half a million people, mostly children under the age of 5, died of the disease last year.  This is an unacceptably high number. Grand Challenges Canada, which is funded by the Government of Canada, supported our team to tweak the host response to malaria  to save the brains of children. The landmark SEQUAMAT and AQUAMAT trials convincingly demonstrated that parenteral artesunate was superior to quinine for the treatment of severe malaria. However, artesunate did not improve the incidence of persistent neurological sequelae compared to quinine.  Neurological sequelae are seen in about 1/3 of survivors…

Where can innovators from all over the world meet to exchange ideas, share their unique innovations, and find inspiration to press on toward their unified goal to protect mothers and newborns during their most vulnerable hours? Answer: the Saving Lives at Birth DevelopmentXChange. The third annual Saving Lives at Birth DevelopmentXChange will take place at…can’t wait to see what the 2013 finalists will bring to the table. This year, the DevelopmentXChange will welcome 53 finalists who have responded to the request for applications from the Saving Lives at Birth challenge. This challenge seeks ground-breaking prevention and treatment approaches for pregnant women and newborns in poor and remote communities around…the Saving Lives at Birth website. Here, you can meet innovators from around the world and in all types of organizations, from non-profits, to universities, faith-based organizations, start-up companies, and more. Read about all their innovations and how they plan to mark themselves as game changers in maternal and newborn health. Then, vote on your…

Five million more children a year now survive to see their fifth birthday than 25 years ago. This is an accomplishment driven by a global commitment to specific targets to reduce under-five deaths and causes of mortality (e.g., malnutrition, HIV, malaria, diarrhea, pneumonia, preterm birth) and strengthened by the ability to measure and track progress…on child survival, innovative approaches were developed and deployed in a timely manner and have thus contributed to the drop in child mortality. While there is cause for celebration – five million more fifth birthdays worth of celebration! – we are failing to ensure that every one of these children is thriving, not just surviving.…the number of children whose growth is moderately or severely restricted (i.e., stunted, with length-for-age less than two standard deviations below the median) and who are growing up in extreme poverty. Physical growth, poverty and gestational age at birth are meaningful at a population level as predictors of poor school achievement and adult outcomes. However,…child’s development. Experiences and environments in the early years substantially shape the developing brain architecture, leading to the range of abilities and learning capacities a child accumulates. Significant adversity early in life can produce physiological disruptions to the developing neural circuits that persist into adulthood. On the flip side, promoting health, providing enriching and nurturing experiences and protecting children from maltreatment in the early years can set them on a trajectory towards long-term health, productivity and participation…