A Wide-Open Field: Three Takeaways on Foundation Support for the Right to Health and Well-Being
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Workers cremate COVID victims in New Delhi, India in early 2021. Photo: Exposure Visuals/shutterstock
Human rights are defined in many ways, from civil to legal and economic. But one fundamental right has moved into the spotlight in the pandemic era: the basic right to health and well-being.
At the same time, the pandemic has shone a light on the dearth of support in that arena from the philanthropic sector.
The outlines of institutional support are all there. Article 25 of the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for health and well-being, including food, clothing, housing, medical care and necessary social services.
The World Health Organization views equal access to the highest available levels of healthcare as its organizing principle, a basic human right for all regardless of gender, religion, or economic and social status. The WHO gave the issue top billing this year, putting inequity in the spotlight on World Health Day and beyond.
Unfortunately, those goals remain largely aspirational. Fault lines along race, geography and other factors were already driving stark inequities before the added stressors of COVID. Now, even people in high-income countries are lining up at food pantries, while nations like Venezuela and South Africa struggle to vaccinate even 10% of their populations.
So where is philanthropy in all this? Relatively speaking, nowhere.
A recently published Candid report on global human rights funding puts total yearly giving at around $3.7 billion, or just two to seven percent of overall foundation giving. News was positive for human rights funding overall, with a 13% uptick year-to-year. But only 9% of the total for human rights was dedicated to health and well-being. The report is a part of Candid’s Advancing Human Rights initiative, created in partnership with the Human Rights Funders Network, Ariadne and Prospera.
The report tracks data from the year 2018, and the world has certainly changed since then. A pandemic and new energy around racial justice are bound to move the needle on giving strategies.
Here are three takeaways from what Candid characterized as “baseline” findings to keep in mind as giving trajectories evolve in a COVID-era and post-COVID world.
Single-digit support
Candid tracks human rights grantmaking along 27 issues and 13 overarching categories, from equal treatment under the law to economic and labor rights. By its definition, the health and well-being category includes the right to adequate housing, the right to food security and the right to enjoy “the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health care.”
Overall, the health and well-being category ranked fourth, behind equality rights; human rights in general; and education, religion and culture—each of which eked out double-digit support, in terms of percentage.
In total, the health and well-being tranche attracted $335 million, representing a total of 2,328 grants. By comparison the lead issue, Equality Rights, drew $642 million in funding, and roughly 6,000 grants.
A new population focus
Acknowledging a gap in past analyses, Candid added “racial and ethnic groups” to the population categories it’s tracking. Future findings may provide a better understanding of the resources being directed toward the health and wellness of communities of color.
Once separated out, the racial and ethnic groups category ranked highest of the nine that Candid tracks, followed by “women and girls” and “children and youth.” Nearly a quarter of overall funding falls under the racial and ethnic groups category, or $893 million. The number of grants hovered near 5,000. Within that, 39% directed funding to specific populations.
Nearly 21% of the total $335 million in foundation support for health and well-being rights, or $71 million, cited a focus on racial and ethnic groups. A third of that, or $24 million, “explicitly” mentioned equity.
Opportunities for growth
Presently, a small number of funders are shouldering much of this work. The top four donors are the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation ($55.2 million), California Endowment ($45.4 million), the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation ($36.4 million) and Oak Foundation ($25.8 million). Between them, they represent half of all giving within the health and well-being rights category.
And there’s lots of room for growth. At the end of the day, total funding to advance the right to health and well-being represents less than 1% of the $8 billion U.S. foundations invested in overall health-directed giving.
If philanthropy hopes to open the taps on what has so far been a trickle of support, there is substantial opportunity to engage.
