The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation awarded $279 million to the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation to support expansion of IHME’s work over the next 10 years, the organizations announced today.
The funding will help IHME build its independent health evidence to foster population health, officials said. Thursday’s award complements past donations from the Gates Foundation, which supports the 25-year vision of the University of Washington’s Population Health Initiative launched in May 2016.
IHME provides measurement and analysis of the most prevalent and expensive global health issues and evaluates strategies to improve outcomes.
The grant will help IHME track global health resource spending and innovations to identify future scenarios, with the goal of helping decision-makers better plan and set population health goals. The funding also supports IHME’s faculty, students and staff.
Further, the funding will support IHME’s involvement as the coordinating center for the Global Burden of Disease project, the largest publishing science collaboration with over 2,000 researchers from around the world.
"IHME is deeply grateful for this funding and the foundation's continued support," IHME’s Director Christopher Murray, MD, said in a statement. "Behind this grant is not simply a decision to continue outstanding research and analysis, but also an uncompromising commitment to use health metrics sciences to improve people's lives."
Melinda Gates, co-chair of the Gates Foundation added that the entity is grateful that IHME “has chosen to innovate to help the poorest people in the world.”
The $279 million grant is the largest private donation in the university’s history. As of January 25, 2017, the Gates Foundation has awarded the University of Washington more than 250 grants that total nearly $1.25 billion.
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Email the writer: jessica.davis@himssmedia.com
