Our very own Acting Director Amy Lin has been named as one of Apolitical’s top 50 leaders in agile governance for navigating disruption this year. The “Agile 50” list seeks to laud politicians, civil servants, entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs driving agility across the globe. The Agile 50 List is a joint initiative of Apolitical and the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council (GFC) on Agile Governance that highlights the contributions of those championing innovation in policy making. Amy was recognized for her leadership of CII, which has worked to strengthen supply chains with private partners, map digital solutions, and help catalyse funds to keep private clinics open across five sub-Saharan African countries despite COVID disruptions. 

INNOVATION

USAID Grand Challenge and DIV winners share their innovator experience at Grand Challenges Annual Meeting (GCAM)

This week, Senior Advisor Meghan Majorowski moderated a discussion at the Grand Challenges Annual Meeting (GCAM) on the challenges of scaling health innovations. In the discussion, past Grand Challenge and DIV winners Kinnos, BluSense Diagnostics, Gradian Health Systems, and Maisha Meds, spoke alongside Zambia MOH-based AMP Health Partner. They emphasized the unique challenges and opportunities in attempting to design impactful Grand Challenges that focus on country-driven efforts targeting scaling innovators.

DIGITAL HEALTH

This summer, students from Harvard T.H. Chan’s Global Health Delivery Intensive program took part in a class that used the board game Architects of Digital Health: COVID-19 Vaccination Campaign to teach lessons about trade-offs and dependencies when investing in digital health. This board game was developed by CII’s Merrick Schaefer. In an Ariadne Labs blog published this week, co-authored by Merrick, the teachers and students discussed the lessons learned when playing the game. Key takeaways included the importance of investing in governance, global standards on data privacy and interoperability, and of preparing systems for the introduction of new technologies for successful vaccine program implementation.

CII PSE and HCD work highlighted in USAID Administrator's 60th anniversary speech

In her remarks to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Agency, USAID Administrator Samantha Power called attention to the importance of private sector engagement (PSE) and human centered design (HCD) in global health programs. Our work to increase access to medicines through our partnership with Project Last Mile (PLM) was highlighted as an example of effectively leveraging private sector expertise to provide essential services. Administrator Power also told the story of how we worked with our Office of HIV/AIDS colleagues to use HCD insights and iterations to design V, an approach to presenting oral PrEP that aims to fit into a young woman’s life as seamlessly and appealingly as her favorite beauty brand.