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Who pays, who decides, and where the work lives

Most global health research money comes from a few wealthy sources, and that shapes which questions get asked. Public and philanthropic funders supply almost ninety percent of the spending aimed at health priorities that disproportionately affect poor countries, and the US National Institutes of Health and the Gates Foundation account for nearly two-thirds of it. Only a fraction of one percent of biomedical research funding goes directly to recipients in low-income countries, where researchers are too often collaborators rather than principal investigators.

Also covered: Development assistance for health · Infectious disease funding · Global health journals · Journal paywalls · Open access movement