Pope’s Global Alliance for the Health of Children
Summary
In 2024, the Patrons of the World’s Children Hospital committed to launch the Pope’s Global Alliance for the Health of Children (the Global Alliance) to create a global network of hospitals and health clinics that will improve children’s health by providing integrated and coordinated medical assistance. The Global Alliance aims to increase equitable access to health care for children living in underserved areas and facing a significant unmet need for both routine and advanced care. The Global Alliance aims to reach close to 500,000 children and their families across 16 countries, including Central African Republic, Papua New Guinea, and Mexico, by 2027. Utilizing a hub-and-spoke model, it will establish a coordinated network of health institutions to facilitate access to care and reduce child mortality due to common and deadly pediatric diseases, such as cancer, congenital anomalies, and heart disease. It will also build local capacity through telehealth interventions in training, mentorship, and expert consultation.
Approach
In 2024, The Patrons of the World’s Children Hospital will launch the Pope’s Global Alliance for the Health of Children (the Global Alliance) to create a global network of over 20 hospitals and health clinics that will improve children’s health by providing integrated and coordinated medical assistance.
The Global Alliance aims to increase equitable access to healthcare for children living in underserved areas and facing significant unmet need for both routine and advanced care, and will reach an estimated 500,000 children and their families by 2027. Utilizing a hub and spoke model, it will establish a coordinated network of health institutions to facilitate access to care and reduce child mortality due to common and deadly pediatric diseases, such as cancer, congenital anomalies, and heart disease. It will also build local capacity through telehealth interventions in training, mentoring, and expert consultation. In this model, specialized medical services are centralized at hub facilities, while spoke facilities (primary care hospitals and clinics ) offer routine care, transferring patients to the hub as needed.
Bambino Gesù, the children’s hospital of the Pope, will serve as the coordinating hub for this initiative. It is one of most renowned children’s hospitals in the world, receiving over 1,500,000 million visits each year. As part of this Commitment, it will both treat children transferred from spoke facilities, as well as mentor and provide virtual training and support of healthcare workers from referring countries, intended to strengthen local workforce capacity in these communities.
Doctors with Africa CUAMM (CUAMM) , Italy’s leading global health delivery nonprofit organization working in sub-Sarahan Africa, will serve as the inaugural implementation partner. In the first year, CUAMM will identify four health facilities to join the network, one each in Uganda, Tanzania, Ethiopia, and Central African Republic. Beginning in the second year of the Commitment, the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions (PIME) will partner to expand the number of participating health facilities across several additional countries, including Cambodia, Papua New Guinea, and Thailand. Almaviva and Teladoc Health, will develop digital capabilities at the participating health facilities along with the platform for telehealth including training and health workforce development. The Georgetown Global Health Institute will partner with the Global Alliance in the development and delivery of spoke training curricula and provision of select teleconsulting services.
Action Plan
Q4/2024
Hire Executive Director, Global Alliance and start building the staff
Design and develop the digital platform
Identify and set up referring hospitals and health clinics
Q1/2025
Set up 3 referring hospitals/health clinics
Integrate Teladoc devices in identified hospital/health clinic
Initiate telemedicine and consultation services
Establish referrals between hub and spoke facilities
Quarterly evaluation
Q2/2025
Scale hub facilities from one to two hospitals
Ongoing telehealth services and referrals
Quarterly evaluation
Refine platform/referral network as necessary
Q3/2025
Scale number of hub facilities
Scale telehealth services to two additional referring facilities
Quarterly evaluation
Refine platform/referral network as necessary
Q4/2025
Quarterly evaluation
Refine platform/referral network as necessary
Q1/2026
Scale telehealth services to two additional referring facilities
Scale number of hub facilities
Quarterly evaluation
Refine platform/referral network as necessary
Q2/2026
Scale telehealth services to 2 additional referring facilities
Scale number of hub facilities
Quarterly evaluation
Refine platform/referral network as necessary
Q3/2026
Scale telehealth services to 2 additional referring facilities
Scale number of hub facilities
Quarterly evaluation
Refine platform/referral network as necessary
Q4/2026
Scale telehealth services to 2 additional referring facilities
Integrate new capacities and features into digital platform, including AI support
Quarterly evaluation
Refine platform/referral network as necessary
Q1/2027
Scale telehealth services to 2 additional referring facilities
Scale number of hub facilities
Quarterly evaluation
Refine platform/referral network as necessary
Q2/2027
Scale telehealth services to 2 additional referring facilities
Scale number of hub facilities
Quarterly evaluation
Refine platform/referral network as necessary
Q3/2027
Scale telehealth services to 2 additional referring facilities
Scale number of hub facilities
Quarterly evaluation
Refine platform/referral network as necessary
Q4/2027
Scale telehealth services to 1 additional referring facility
Integrate new capacities and features into digital platform, including AI support
Refine platform/referral network as necessary
Quarterly evaluation
Refine platform/referral network as necessary
Background
In 2022, an estimated 4.9 million children worldwide died before seeing their fifth birthday – or, stated another way, approximately 13,425 children died each day (UN IGME) . Enormous disparities in the mortality rate remain between rich and poor countries, and Sub-Saharan Africa has the highest under-5 mortality rate of any region in the world. Four out of every five deaths occur in sub-Saharan Africa or South Asia (UN IGME) . These deaths are primarily due to preventable or treatable causes.
It is estimated that 80% – 85% of pediatric cancer cases occur in the developing world, where the five-year survival rate can be less than 10%. This is in contrast to the U.S. and western European countries, where it is approximately 70%. Additionally, congenital heart disease (CHD) , the most common of all birth defects, occurs in approximately nine per 1000 live births globally. Each year, about 1.35 million children are born with CHD; 90% of those born with CHD are born in a place with inadequate resources for pediatric cardiac care. (The Journal of Pediatrics, Vol. 162, Issue 6, June 2013) Many of these differences in outcomes are exacerbated by a lack of health workforce professionals in sufficient numbers to cover the needs of the population. Currently, high-income countries have a health worker density that is 6.5 times that of low-income countries (BMJ Global Health) . Better access to quality healthcare, including the ability to adequately diagnose and treat childhood illnesses, as well as an increased number of skilled healthcare personnel, are required to address the disparities in pediatric health outcomes between high- and low-income countries.
Ensuring equitable access to quality health care is the most important action that can be taken so that, no matter where they are born, all children have the best hopes for their future.
Progress Update
Partnership Opportunities
Commitment partners are seeking financial resources, equipment, devices, and medical and health commodities that can help strengthen diagnostic and treatment capacity at the Spoke healthcare facilities., Patrons of the World’s Children Hospital and its partners are offering topic expertise, through curricula development and the training of healthcare personnel, which can help other organizations working in similar geographies.