Insurance Makes for Good Medicine

September 14, 2010

Freedom from Hunger, a California-based group that has been working for decades to alleviate chronic hunger and poverty around the world, has just completed a four-year program helping microfinance institutions integrate health protection options into their product and service offerings.

"Our solution is to bring together the economic development and health sectors to develop practical and coordinated tools that have more power to create lasting change," explains Chris Dunford, the group's President.

Freedom from Hunger worked with five MFIs, one each in Benin, Bolivia, Burkina Faso and the Philippines to implement several health programs. The programs included:

• health savings accounts
• health loans
• health insurance
• health education
• group discounts with specified health care providers
• mobile healthcare programs in rural villages
• distributing insecticide-treated mosquito nets

The pilot had financial backing from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

In evaluating its pilot, Freedom from Hunger was able to demonstrate the obvious connection between poor health and poverty. In Benin, for example, they found families in the program were 23% more likely to own an anti-malarial net. In India, the use of an oral rehydration solution to treat diarrhea in children increased 47% during the four-year program.

"These are incredible outcomes after only a brief intervention and they show that this work is having impact," says Marcia Metcalfe, Director of Microfinance and Health Protection at Freedom from Hunger. "Microfinance has enormous potential as a financially viable mechanism for reaching poor, rural people with simple but life-saving health protection services."

Freedom from Hunger says it stands ready to help other MFIs to improve efficiencies, as well as financial and social goals.

"Our experience has shown that well-established microfinance banks can offer valuable health-related options to their clients at low or not cost to the bank itself," says Myka Reinsch, Special Advisor at Freedom from Hunger. In fact, Reinsch notes, that in some cases banks could end up profiting from increased loyalty that often accompanies such offerings.

Freedom from Hunger has extensive documentation, commentary and even a short video illustrating success stories from the pilot. Click here to learn more.

Americans purchase $75 billion a year in money orders from non-banks

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