Q&A

WHO Foundation chief becomes a global health 'matchmaker'

Anil Soni, the CEO of the WHO Foundation, reflects on the organization's origins, its unique relationship with WHO, and the critical role it plays in addressing global health challenges, including working with philanthropies, the private sector, and the public


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Anil Soni, WHO Foundation CEO
Anil Soni, WHO Foundation CEO
© WHO Foundation

Anil Soni, the CEO of the WHO Foundation, considers his role as something akin to a global health matchmaker. "It’s about aligning … interests with the work of WHO," he said. "The key is matching ... resources with the relevant programs and people at WHO. Because ultimately, when you give or partner, it’s about people, and it’s about shared values."

Established as an independent entity in 2020, the WHO Foundation was created to mobilize resources from outside traditional government funding, engaging philanthropies, the private sector, and the public to bolster the World Health Organization’s mission of achieving health for all.

Soni, who became chief executive in 2021 after serving as head of global infectious diseases at Viatris, a pharmaceutical company, and was previously CEO of the Clinton Health Access Initiative, has championed the idea that the global health sector should work closely with all these stakeholders, including the private sector. "The concern over conflicts of interest is real," he said, "But the way we come together is by finding alignment. When we identify alignment, we can achieve meaningful collaboration."

In this interview, Soni reflects on the Foundation's origins, its unique relationship with WHO, and the critical role it plays in addressing global health challenges. From championing innovative partnerships to ensuring funding aligns with evidence- based priorities, Soni explains how the WHO Foundation is enabling the global health body to respond to emergencies, strengthen national health systems, and prepare for the future – all while remaining grounded in the needs of the communities it serves.

Could you share what inspired the creation of the WHO Foundation and how its mission aligns with the overarching goals of WHO, particularly in supporting health for all?

Soni: The World Health Organization is the world’s health agency. It plays a critical role – acting in many countries as the FDA (US Food and Drug Administration), NIHR (the UK National Institutes of Health and Care Research), and CDC (US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention). WHO is also a member state-driven organization, meaning that much of its power and authority comes from the fact that governments come together to shape its agenda. As a UN agency, WHO is largely funded by its member states.

But that funding is not enough, which is something many organizations grapple with: the inadequacy of funding and lack of predictable financing. Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO’s current leader, has made improving the financing of WHO and its role in global health a priority. That strategy has a number of pillars, one of which is the WHO Foundation. It’s critical to understand that the Foundation is part of a broader vision – ensuring that WHO plays its role as the piston in the engine of global health. Many global health partnerships, such as the Global Fund or GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance, depend on WHO. National governments also depend on WHO.

So first off, the goal is: we are not here to serve ourselves. We’re here to serve communities. We do that through a very specific role and we need predictable financing to do that. And that means our main donors – governments – have to do their parts. What WHO has done, first and foremost, is say to those governments, 'We need more flexible and long-term financing from you.' In addition to government support, we also need more robust engagement with and funding from other sources. For WHO, that means anyone who is not a government, including philanthropies, the public, and companies. The Foundation was created as a platform to engage these sectors more robustly and to make sure that we could have resource mobilization from them.

The Foundation actually came about because of the open-door policy of Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (WHO Director- General). Someone came in and said, 'Hey, UNICEF has national committees. The Red Cross has national committees. Why don’t we have an equivalent? Why don’t we have an affiliate that does that work with us?' That idea was then taken up by Prof. Dr. Thomas Zeltner, who is the chair of our board. He’s a longtime representative of the Swiss government to WHO and our founder. He wrote the initial check to create the Foundation, which was created as a Swiss nonprofit. So even though we carry WHO in our name, we are an independent Swiss foundation that works hand-in-glove with WHO to engage those non-member state constituencies, including philanthropies, the public, and companies. That’s our origin story.

The WHO Foundation collaborates with a variety of partners, including private sector organizations, philanthropies, and individual donors. What characteristics make for the most effective partnerships, and why is multisectoral collaboration so critical to achieving impact?

Soni: There are a couple of really important questions there. First, I embrace the importance of aligning interests between entities. Too often, I think, public institutions can see their roles – and I’ll be open and transparent – as sacrosanct. It’s critical that these roles, particularly in the case of WHO, are not influenced by the interests of other entities, especially corporate or for-profit interests. However, any entity like WHO – whether it’s being funded by a national government or a private sector entity – must acknowledge that there are competing interests. And you want to make sure that we are aligning those interests while protecting the neutrality of WHO’s functions. This issue can arise with governments, which may have specific health priorities, or with companies. The reason I'm emphasizing this is that the concern over conflicts of interest is real. I don’t mean to minimize it. But the way we come together is by finding alignment. When we identify alignment, we can achieve meaningful collaboration.

When it comes to companies, philanthropies, and the public, my function is to demonstrate how WHO plays a critical role in what they want to achieve in the world. It’s about aligning their interests with the work of WHO. A lot of what we’re trying to do is act as a matchmaker – bringing together entities with good intentions and helping them allocate those resources toward having an impact in the world. The key is matching those resources with the relevant programs and people at WHO. Because ultimately, when you give or partner, it’s about people, and it’s about shared values

This ties into your question about why multisectoral collaboration is so important. Let me talk for a moment about the public and private sectors. Much of health globally is not in the public sector. When you ask, 'How much of the money that goes into health – almost US$10 trillion a year – comes from the public sector versus the private sector?' a big share of that is private sector, and not just in the United States. If you look at health care delivery globally, a significant amount is provided outside of government-owned or government-run systems. This includes faith-based organizations, for-profits, and nonprofits. A sizable contribution of health care delivery comes from outside the public sector. You cannot achieve health for all if you’re only working with part of the system. You have to embrace the totality of the system. That’s why these partnerships matter.

One good example of this is WHO’s work with technology companies. Today, 90% of health journeys start with an online search. A lot of people, when they have a health condition or question – when they’re asking, 'What is this? Why is my chest hurting? Why is my leg hurting? Do I go to a doctor for this? Is this depression?' – start online. We know people aren't coming directly to us or even going to a doctor who might normally receive WHO guidelines. Instead, they’re going to Google, Meta, or TikTok. WHO has embraced this reality. Rather than saying, 'No, we’re going to somehow convince billions of people to stop using Google for their health searches, we've said, 'This is the world we live in.' So we have to work with Google, we have to work with Meta, and we have to work with TikTok.

The goal is to ensure that when people search for health information, the answers they receive are accurate and point them to credible health authorities, whether that’s WHO or a national authority. Additionally, WHO is working to equip influencers to help spread reliable information, which I think is pretty amazing. WHO created the Fides Network, which works directly with influencers, equipping them with accurate information so they can share it with their audiences.

What role do in-country experts play in supporting the work of the WHO Foundation? How do you take into consideration or engage communities who are core to global health funding and initiatives?

Soni: A lot of the work that we fund – and again, the Foundation’s purpose is to raise resources – ultimately goes to in- country experts and implementers. For example, if you think about the work we’ve funded in emergency response, we started right around the COVID-19 pandemic. We raised significant resources for WHO’s response to COVID-19. But over time, that effort morphed into supporting other health emergencies. And honestly, there are too many emergencies to count – it’s not in the single digits; it was more than 70 in 2023 alone.

One example is the Ukraine conflict. When that war began, we created a fundraising initiative to raise money that went directly to stakeholders in Ukraine. This included WHO, the national ministry of health, and national experts who worked together to address key questions such as 'Where do we set up mobile hospitals? What goods are most urgently needed? What surgical supplies should we prioritize? How do we triage the types of cases we’re seeing?' This is an example where we raised money to ensure resources were directed to the experts on the ground. We’re not the experts – I don’t claim to be – but we make sure that resources reach those who are.

I saw this firsthand. Initially, because we were raising so much for emergency response, we eventually adapted and evolved to also raise funds for preparedness. Instead of waiting for an emergency to strike, we wanted to help prepare for them. I recently met with the Maasai community in Kenya and saw the devastating effects of climate change and severe weather. While I was there, I also met incredible colleagues, including a woman named Fatima from northern Nigeria.

Fatima was leading efforts to set up a WHO emergency hub in Nairobi. Fatima shared that historically, when emergencies struck, they would have to mobilize new funds, raise money, procure goods, and then get them to the people who needed them. This process could take weeks – weeks that could mean the difference between life and death. Fatima and her colleagues were working with the Kenyan government to create an emergency hub in Nairobi. These hubs ensure that when emergencies strike on the African continent – whether it’s an outbreak or a natural disaster – life-saving supplies, medicines, and first responders can reach affected areas more quickly.

How do you ensure that the financial support aligns with evidence-based findings? What are some examples of initiatives where this alignment has made a significant impact?

Soni: A lot of what we’re trying to do in raising resources for WHO is ensuring that financial support aligns with evidence- based findings. We approach potential supporters of health initiatives and say, 'The way you can have the maximum impact with each dollar is to support evidence.' And where is that evidence reviewed, collated, and distilled? It’s at the World Health Organization. In many ways, WHO is a crucible for global health evidence. It ensures that its initiatives and guidance to countries reflect the latest science and that governments incorporate this evidence into their policies and practices.

A strong example of this is WHO’s Special Initiative on Mental Health. WHO has recognized that mental health is far too neglected globally. I don’t even like to use the word 'disorders' because it exemplifies the stigma surrounding mental health – the idea that it’s something broken that needs to be fixed or treated. Instead, we should see mental health as encompassing stresses and challenges that are common to millions of people. The question is: how do we ensure that when we think about health, we are addressing both physical and mental health?

Exemplars in Global Health studies successes in global health. What do you see as the benefits to studying such successes? And how do you integrate this type of research – studying what works – into your decision making?

Soni: I think there are two aspects of this that are important. One is that, whether you’re a scientist, a consultant, or an executive, you always want to do what works, right? It’s pretty basic – you only do what works if you measure. We do what we measure, and by looking at what works, we can be that much more effective and efficient in reaching people with global health interventions. At the end of the day, as I often say, it’s about the math.

To me, Exemplars plays a critical role in identifying what works – not just in theory, but in practice – and in helping us replicate those successes. And let’s be honest, a lot of times we don’t know. There are so many good intentions in global health and development, and there are a lot of new initiatives, but we don’t really know what works until we measure – until we actually start the doing and the trying. That’s one piece of it, and maybe it speaks to the 'head center of intelligence' – the analytical, evidence-based part of decision making.

But there’s also the 'heart center of intelligence,' and this is where success plays another critical role: inspiration. Problems are what we need to tackle, but sometimes what we need is hope. Sometimes what we need is inspiration. Sometimes what we need is stories. The reason I mentioned Fatima is because it’s often only in meeting someone or hearing a personal story of success – not just the numbers, not just the data – that we’re inspired to do more. We’re social creatures; we’re emotional creatures. Exemplars does both of these things.

Looking ahead, where do you envision the WHO Foundation in the coming years? And what do you hope will be its most lasting impact on achieving Health for All?

Soni: I think about other organizations. When you say UNICEF, you don’t necessarily differentiate between UNICEF, the United Nations agency, and UNICEF USA, which is the organization that represents UNICEF to Americans and mobilizes about a billion dollars per year. Let’s give credit where it’s due – that’s a success.

My vision is that the WHO Foundation plays a similar role for WHO in the next five to 10 years. We aim to be an integrated affiliate that strengthens WHO’s fundraising and resource mobilization efforts. We’ve worked hard to shape the foundation’s identity to complement WHO’s, with a distinct voice that underscores our shared mission. The goal isn’t to create separation but to reinforce that we are part of a unified whole. That level of alignment is what I hope we can achieve.

The second piece of this vision is ensuring more adequate, predictable, and resilient funding for WHO. This would contribute to a shared goal with our colleagues across the street at WHO: that the organization is not constantly looking for its next influx of funds just to keep people on staff. We live in a world with deep inequities and extreme needs, where climate change is exacerbating those challenges. Yet frontline responders at WHO don’t know if they’ll be paid in six months. We’re failing them and, by extension, the communities they serve. WHO needs to be adequately funded, and my hope is not just that we’re well-integrated into WHO, but that together, we succeed in achieving the resource mobilization goals we were created to fulfill.

The third piece is that resource mobilization becomes a reflection of the WHO Foundation as an effective platform for engaging private sector partners. Often, when you meet with executives at health care companies, they’ll say, 'We need WHO, but it’s hard to work with WHO. It’s hard to navigate WHO.' These companies are often seen with suspicion simply because they’re for-profit entities, not nonprofits. I think there’s a strong desire for greater collaboration and partnership, like we’ve seen with technology companies.

My hope is that the WHO Foundation becomes a genuine platform for this kind of engagement. I’ve spent half my career in the private sector, so I can speak the language of profit and loss without hesitation. If we can create programs that meet the needs of both WHO and its private sector partners, while advancing health for all and promoting social justice, I believe we will be successful. I firmly believe in my bones that we need to do this – and that we can do it. If the Foundation can be a platform for that type of meaningful engagement, I’ll consider it a success.

And finally, the fourth and last piece: I want the WHO Foundation to become an engine of innovation. We need to be more effective in how we innovate. To me, innovation is about making the best use of existing evidence, emerging evidence, and new technologies to do more with what we have. Becoming an engine of innovation means creating opportunities for WHO to fund the latest and greatest science, the most cutting-edge approaches, and new ways of thinking.

If we can achieve all these, I think the WHO Foundation will play a transformative role in global health over the coming years.

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