The END Fund supports country-led programs that control and eliminate intestinal worms, schistosomiasis, lymphatic filariasis, river blindness, trachoma, and visceral leishmaniasis. This includes delivering NTD treatments to children and adults, providing surgeries to prevent blindness and disability, and training healthcare workers in the hardest-to-reach communities to promote long-term sustainability.
The END Fund is dedicated to ending neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) that impact the lives of 1.65 billion people around the world, of which nearly 1 billion are children.
The END Fund reports that a child with a moderate worm infection has, on average, 200 parasitic worms in their belly, each 30 centimeters long (longer than a standard #2 pencil). These worms can cause malnutrition, stunted physical and cognitive development, long-term damage, and even death as a result of intestinal obstructions.Worms also zap the energy out of affected individuals, thereby making it less likely for children to attend or focus in school and for adults to be productive. Ultimately, intestinal worms and schistosomiasis make it harder for a person to lead a full and productive life.
Yet, these diseases are mind-blowingly inexpensive to treat, and the END Fund believes that the sickness they cause can be effectively prevented, and even eliminated, in our lifetime. Deworming pills have already been generously donated by pharmaceutical companies. As such, the END Fund reports that it costs less than $0.50 per person per year to deliver them to communities at risk for these parasitic diseases.
The END Fund mobilises funding from investors and works with expert in-country partners to deliver life-changing deworming medicines to where they will have the most impact. The END Fund focuses on supporting interventions aimed at controlling and eliminating intestinal worms, schistosomiasis, and other NTDs by:
As of 2023, the END Fund and its partners have provided over 1.5 billion NTD treatments since its founding in 2012, with a reported 284 million treatments delivered to more than 201 million people in 2022 alone.
The impact-focused evaluator Founders Pledge conducted an internal analysis of the cost-effectiveness of The END Fund’s deworming programme in 2023 with a favourable conclusion. The END Fund’s deworming programme was also previously one of our recommended charities due to GiveWell’s inclusion of it as a top-rated giving opportunity from 2016 to 2022. GiveWell’s decision to no longer recommend The END Fund’s deworming programme was not based on any shift in thinking about The END Fund, but rather a change in GiveWell’s top charity criteria.
Some research shows that deworming has positive effects on improved life outcomes like school attendance and income earnings. There is also some uncertainty surrounding findings that link deworming programmes to improved life outcomes — see GiveWell’s in-depth report on the case for mass deworming.