The Nonlinear Library EA - Introducing Ansh: A Charity Entrepreneurship Incubated Charity by Supriya
May 29, 2024
22:03
Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Introducing Ansh: A Charity Entrepreneurship Incubated Charity, published by Supriya on May 29, 2024 on The Effective Altruism Forum.
Executive Summary
Ansh, a 1-year-old Charity Entrepreneurship incubated charity, has been delivering an evidence-based, scientifically proven intervention called Kangaroo Care to low birth weight and premature babies in 2 government hospitals in India since January 2024. Ansh estimates that their programs are saving, on average, 4 lives a month per facility and a total of 98 lives per year. The cost of one life saved is approximately $2077 (current costs, not a potential estimate).
Ansh is now replicating the programs in two additional hospitals, doubling their impact before the end of this year.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), neonatal conditions[1] are among the top 10 causes of death worldwide[2]. This makes neonatal mortality one of the largest-scale causes of suffering and death today. In 2022, 2.3 million babies died in the first 28 days of life (i.e. the newborn/neonatal period) (World Health Organisation, 2024). Let's compare that number to one of EA's other top cause areas.
In 2022, 608,000 people died of malaria, which is about 26.4% lower than neonatal conditions. However, we have a cost-effective, scalable model for preventing malaria-caused death (e.g., with AMF and Malaria Consortium). Unfortunately, there has been no equivalently cost-effective and scalable model for preventing neonatal mortality.
In this post, we will introduce Ansh, a 1-year-old Charity Entrepreneurship incubated charity that is working towards building tractable, scalable solutions to neonatal mortality in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). 81% of neonatal deaths happen in low and Low-Middle SDI countries. The disparities in mortality rates between low and high-resource contexts suggest that most neonatal deaths are preventable.
In the sections below, we will first introduce Ansh and its mission statement, share our results thus far, and then introduce some of our plans for how to increase our reach and impact over the next few years. We are very excited to share the work we've done so far with the EA community, and to hear your constructive feedback on how we can make our non-profit even more impactful!
I. The Problem and Solution
More than half of all neonatal deaths occur within the first three days after birth (Dol J, 2021) and over 75% in the first week of life (WHO, 2024), making it imperative to reach babies as soon after birth as possible. Moreover, low birth weight (LBW)[3] is considered the number one mortality risk factor for children under 5.
In fact, according to the Global Burden of Disease, around 89% of all newborn deaths in India (the country where about 22% of all newborn deaths in the world occur) happen to LBW and preterm newborns. Further, 81% of all newborn deaths occur in Low or Low-Middle SDI countries (Global Burden of Disease Collaborative Network, 2019).
Hence, the most effective path toward reducing neonatal mortality rates globally lies in developing interventions aimed at helping LBW babies during their first week of life in LMIC contexts.
Thankfully, such an intervention exists: Kangaroo Care. Kangaroo Care (KC) needs neither fancy equipment nor expensive technology - the methods of KC are both simple and highly effective, especially for LBW newborns. KC requires early, continuous, and prolonged skin-to-skin contact between the mother (or another caregiver) and the baby for about 8 hours of contact per day-paired with exclusive breastfeeding and close monitoring of the baby.
This is often assisted with a cloth binder, between the LBW newborn and caregiver (preferably the mother), to allow for mobility. Estimates from the 2016 Cochrane review suggest that KC can reduce LBW neonates' chance of (i) ...
Executive Summary
Ansh, a 1-year-old Charity Entrepreneurship incubated charity, has been delivering an evidence-based, scientifically proven intervention called Kangaroo Care to low birth weight and premature babies in 2 government hospitals in India since January 2024. Ansh estimates that their programs are saving, on average, 4 lives a month per facility and a total of 98 lives per year. The cost of one life saved is approximately $2077 (current costs, not a potential estimate).
Ansh is now replicating the programs in two additional hospitals, doubling their impact before the end of this year.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), neonatal conditions[1] are among the top 10 causes of death worldwide[2]. This makes neonatal mortality one of the largest-scale causes of suffering and death today. In 2022, 2.3 million babies died in the first 28 days of life (i.e. the newborn/neonatal period) (World Health Organisation, 2024). Let's compare that number to one of EA's other top cause areas.
In 2022, 608,000 people died of malaria, which is about 26.4% lower than neonatal conditions. However, we have a cost-effective, scalable model for preventing malaria-caused death (e.g., with AMF and Malaria Consortium). Unfortunately, there has been no equivalently cost-effective and scalable model for preventing neonatal mortality.
In this post, we will introduce Ansh, a 1-year-old Charity Entrepreneurship incubated charity that is working towards building tractable, scalable solutions to neonatal mortality in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). 81% of neonatal deaths happen in low and Low-Middle SDI countries. The disparities in mortality rates between low and high-resource contexts suggest that most neonatal deaths are preventable.
In the sections below, we will first introduce Ansh and its mission statement, share our results thus far, and then introduce some of our plans for how to increase our reach and impact over the next few years. We are very excited to share the work we've done so far with the EA community, and to hear your constructive feedback on how we can make our non-profit even more impactful!
I. The Problem and Solution
More than half of all neonatal deaths occur within the first three days after birth (Dol J, 2021) and over 75% in the first week of life (WHO, 2024), making it imperative to reach babies as soon after birth as possible. Moreover, low birth weight (LBW)[3] is considered the number one mortality risk factor for children under 5.
In fact, according to the Global Burden of Disease, around 89% of all newborn deaths in India (the country where about 22% of all newborn deaths in the world occur) happen to LBW and preterm newborns. Further, 81% of all newborn deaths occur in Low or Low-Middle SDI countries (Global Burden of Disease Collaborative Network, 2019).
Hence, the most effective path toward reducing neonatal mortality rates globally lies in developing interventions aimed at helping LBW babies during their first week of life in LMIC contexts.
Thankfully, such an intervention exists: Kangaroo Care. Kangaroo Care (KC) needs neither fancy equipment nor expensive technology - the methods of KC are both simple and highly effective, especially for LBW newborns. KC requires early, continuous, and prolonged skin-to-skin contact between the mother (or another caregiver) and the baby for about 8 hours of contact per day-paired with exclusive breastfeeding and close monitoring of the baby.
This is often assisted with a cloth binder, between the LBW newborn and caregiver (preferably the mother), to allow for mobility. Estimates from the 2016 Cochrane review suggest that KC can reduce LBW neonates' chance of (i) ...