Case Study: Pfizer and the Global Health Fellows Program

Pfizer encourages highly-skilled employees from its research and business divisions around the world to apply for volunteer assignments with multi-lateral and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). Assignments are designed to utilize Fellows’ professional skills to help expand and improve health care services for people with limited or insufficient access to care.

The Opportunity

Health care providers around the world lack more than needed medicines. Across the health care spectrum, organizations such as hospitals, clinics and community health programs, are in need of diverse professional skills that build management and medical research capacity though training and knowledge sharing to enable strong execution of health-related programs with limited financial and human resources.

Pfizer’s Pro Bono Investment

Pfizer colleagues commit to local field-based assignments in Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe, Latin America and the United States ranging from 3 to 6 months to expand basic health care infrastructure and address devastating diseases such as: HIV/AIDS and malaria. Fellowship assignments are designed by Pfizer’s partners according to their needs, and Pfizer funds the Fellows’ transportation, lodging and other expenses. During their assignments, colleagues train and support their local counterparts, transferring skills so that the important contributions they make are sustainable over time.

The Impact

Since 2003, 194 Global Health Fellows have been selected to work with nongovernmental organizations in 38 countries to deliver health care and health system support to those in need around the world. These Fellows include Pfizer physicians, nurses, epidemiologists, laboratory technicians, marketing managers, financial administrators, and health educators from the United States, Europe, Latin America, Australia and Asia. Pfizer’s careful monitoring and evaluation of the program shows that the social impact of its fellows’ efforts on the ground is significant. An extensive review of the Global Health Fellows Program by Boston University found that 100 percent of partners reported that Pfizer fellows’ work in the field sped up sustainable change, and 86 percent of partners reported that performance either “exceeded” or “significantly exceeded” initial fellowship assignment responsibilities.

About the Partners

Pfizer’s partners in this program have included: African Medical and Research Foundation (AMREF), Africare, American Cancer Society, American Jewish World Service, BroadReach Health Care, The Access Project at Columbia University’s Earth Institute, Family Health International, Health Volunteers Overseas, Infectious Diseases Institute and Accordia Foundation, Institute for OneWorld Health, International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI), International Rescue Committee, International Trachoma Initiative, Population Services International, Project HOPE, Global Business Coalition for HIV/AIDS, Malaria and Tuberculosis (GBC), United States Agency for International Development (USAID), WaterAid, PanAmerican Health Organization (PAHO), and IntraHealth.

About Pfizer

Pfizer discovers and develops innovative medicines to treat and help prevent disease for both people and animals. We also partner with healthcare providers, governments and local communities around the world to expand access to our medicines and to provide better quality healthcare and health system support.