Parasitic worms, or soil-transmitted helminths (STH), are among the most prevalent causes of illness among the world’s poorest and most vulnerable populations, especially children. Close to a quarter of the world’s population is infected with at least one species of STH, and globally an estimated 870 million children are at risk of a new infection

Today the world celebrates International Day of Charity, declared by the UN General Assembly in 2012. The UN’s agenda on sustainable development calls for the eradication of global poverty and the Sustainable Development Goals provide a framework by which institutions, organizations, and individuals can give charitably for the betterment of our world. To honor your giving, we want to show why we value your contribution today and every other day.

To comprehensively determine the burden, intensity, and geographical distribution of STH in Pakistan and to inform an appropriate treatment strategy, Evidence Action’s Deworm the World Initiative collaborated with Interactive Research and Development (IRD), the Indus Hospital, and the Institute of Development and Economic Alternatives (IDEAS) to conduct the first nationwide STH survey in Pakistan in late 2016.

No Lean Season, a program of nonprofit organization Evidence Action, today announced major support from the Global Innovation Fund. The Global Innovation Fund (GIF) is a London-headquartered investor in social innovations that aim to improve the lives and opportunities of millions of people in the developing world.  The total investment from GIF for the next two years is $2,571,210. The funds will be used to support the rigorous testing and expansion of No Lean Season in Bangladesh and Indonesia.

Press Release: No Lean Season, a program of nonprofit organization Evidence Action that reduces seasonal poverty and hunger through small cash transfers for bus tickets, announces backing by Y Combinator and the launch of an ambitious drive to combat seasonal poverty.

Evidence Action’s Board today announced that Kanika Bahl will be its new CEO.
 

Evidence Action Beta is looking for ambitious researchers whose work or insights could benefit millions of people living in poverty, and who want to participate in seeing their research turned into viable, scaled up programs. 

Have you done work that has similar potential?  Read on! 

The first cohort of “No Lean Season” participants in northern Bangladesh are on their way. More than 4,500 rural workers are traveling temporarily to nearby areas with higher wages and greater labor opportunities to support their family during the lean season. A few thousand more are expected to join the ranks before the end of the lean season around mid-December in Rangpur, the target area for the initial roll-out of the program. Here is an update. 

We are thrilled to be on the GiveWell recommended charity list this year again for the work we do at the Deworm the World Initiative. It is a great honor. 

Evidence Action is pleased to support Kenya’s Ministry of Health and its Neglected Tropical Disease (NTD) Unit as it carries out mass treatment for lymphatic filariasis. Led by the government of Kenya, treatment is provided to  communities in all six of Kenya’s endemic counties, targeting over 2.3 million adults and children.

Evidence Action is pleased to announce the appointment of two new board members to its Board of Directors: Shikhar Ghosh, a profession of management practice at Harvard University and an experienced entrepreneur, and John Gianola, a retired partner at Ernst & Young.

Photo impressions from the preparation for the last National Deworming Day round in India. Community mobilization and promotion of the Deworming Day is important to increase coverage and get community and political buy-in for the largest, single-day community health program in the world.  

Evidence Action’s Chief Executive Officer, Jeffrey Brown, has announced that he has resigned from the organization, effective November 21, 2016, to pursue other opportunities. Kanika Bahl, Evidence Action’s Board Chair, will serve as acting CEO. Evidence Action will conduct a global search for a new CEO.

We are exploring the potential of  leveraging the Dispensers for Safe Water network of local water promoters to deliver nutritional messages to families. We believe that the existing network of trained and dedicated individuals can provide a cost-effective way to increase household knowledge about nutrition, and potentially reduce undernutrition and malnutrition among children. This is the story of a randomized controlled trial to evaluate this. 

Scale is all about execution. This means constantly evaluating and improving our programs. We collect data on our key performance indicators, in order to make data-driven and evidence-based decisions on what works and on what we need to change. We collect data in a variety of ways but have been pushing hard to increase real-time, tech-enabled monitoring of our performance, and quick, streamlined, and action-oriented analysis. Here is what we are doing, with a frank assessment on how it’s going. 

Check out our new dashboard with real-time key performance indicators for Dispensers for Safe Water, our flagship program in East Africa. See how we are doing - any time! 

The Government of India held National Deworming Day 2016 on February 10, deworming 179 million children in 1.8 million preschools and schools. Evidence Action’s Deworm the World Initiative is the technical assistance provider to the Government of India, and is also working closely with seven state governments to implement National Deworming Day. 

To increase the number of children dewormed this year, we wanted to bring private schools into the fold of this government-led program that especially target poorer children. And we did: for the first time, 170,000 private schools dewormed their pupils across the country.

Students gather for deworming medical tablet distribution at Upper Primary School in Janaksinghpura in Rajasthan, India on February 10, 2016 during National Deworming Day. (Kuni Takahashi/AP Images for Evidence Action)

Earlier this year, India held the largest public health event conducted in one day: The country dewormed 179 million children in almost all states and Union territories, according to the government’s latest figure. Deworming took place in 810,000 government schools, 800,000 preschools (anganwadi centers) and, for the first time, in 170,000 private schools. School-based deworming leverages anganwadi workers and teachers to deliver safe, simple treatment for parasitic worms. 

Evidence Action’s Deworm the World Initiative is the principal technical assistance provider to the Government of India’s National Deworming Day and our team was instrumental in making it happen. 

Today, Evidence Action welcomes the release of a new study that shows that mass deworming of children has a significant positive effect on child weight and is highly cost effective, with a weight gain per dollar 35 times greater than school feeding programs.

This study strongly refutes findings from a previous critique of mass deworming of children in developing countries with high levels of parasitic worms, a Cochrane meta analysis by Taylor-Robinson et al (2015.) that questioned the long-standing World Health Organization (WHO) policy supporting mass deworming.

The new research, “Does Mass Deworming Affect Child Nutrition?: Meta-analysis, Cost-Effectiveness, and Statistical Power” was authored by Kevin Croke, Joan Hamory Hicks, Eric Hsu, Michael Kremer, and Edward Miguel.

This week, the Cross River State Ministry of Health’s Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTD) unit launched its inaugural statewide school-based deworming exercise that will treat against two neglected tropical diseases that are particularly common in children: schistosomiasis and soil-transmitted helminthiasis (STH). The school-based deworming exercise will cover 11 of the 18 local government areas in Cross River for the first time, and is targeting 600,000 at-risk school-aged children in primary and junior secondary public and private schools.

Press Release: 

Evidence Action, a global development organization focused on scaling rigorously-evaluated programs, and RDRS Bangladesh, a leading development organization in northern Bangladesh, today announced a four-year partnership.  

The partnership will field-test and promote ‘No Lean Season,’ an innovative anti-poverty intervention aimed at reducing seasonal income insecurity in poor rural communities. No Lean Season will reach 310,000 low-income households in Northern Bangladesh in the next four years.

On April 28 and 29, more than 700,000 primary school children across four provinces in northern Vietnam will line up in their classrooms to receive a deworming tablet. 8.5 million children in Vietnam are at risk of parasitic worm infections that can harm their health, development, and school participation.

We are excited to announce that Evidence Action’s Deworm the World Initiative supports the Government of  Vietnam as it strengthens and improves school-based deworming to keep children healthy and in school. Read more about out partnership there, and about what we are doing.