The Search For Solutions

The project that Edge helped put together is called IFFIm, the International Finance Facility for Immunisation. It started with a phone call. In 2002, Brown was the chancellor of the exchequer, in charge of the Treasury. His officials called up Goldman Sachs wanting a favor: could the bank help out with an innovative scheme for raising money on the bond markets? And could it do so in the next two months? Free of charge? Goldman Sachs said yes and handed over the responsibility to Edge. He was barely out of his 20s, but he had the right résumé for the job. He'd already done some similar bond work for post-apartheid South Africa.

Later, Edge would start wondering why someone hadn't done this sort of thing already for vaccines. The answer: it was hard. The project called for banking skills, but it also required some mediation. The money he raised was earmarked for the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI). The agency is market-oriented and famous for getting results fast. But it's still a nonprofit, and it wants to help people—not exactly the kind of value that always shows up on a balance sheet.

At one point, negotiations hit a bit of a snag. Several European governments had agreed to back IFFIm's first bond offering, but the tricky rules of budgeting stopped them from offering megabucks upfront. Edge offered what seemed to him like a reasonable solution: make the aid dollars conditional on financial good behavior. Legally, that would allow the governments to offer money in big lump sums. But to GAVI, Edge's clause was heresy. Failing states with messy finances were the ones who needed help the most; the agency didn't want to abandon poor people there. Edge scratched his head. Then he saw a loophole: GAVI could take care of the most chaotic countries with the part of its budget that didn't come from IFFIm. From that point things started to move.

IFFIM finally launched last November. Since then, it has sponsored efforts against measles, polio, tetanus and yellow fever. Edge is still a moneyman, now at RMB International. He looks back fondly on his vaccination project, and he says (maybe jokingly) that it helps him sleep at night. It was also a rare opportunity to do good while also doing well. No matter what his cuff links look like, that shouldn't tarnish them too much.

This week many of the world's smartest humanitarians will be in New York City for the Clinton Global Initiative, a gathering that is half policy briefing and half drum circle. On Wednesday, a panel will consider the problems that people like Binka, Emini, Edwards and Edge are facing. No one can say exactly when, or even if, these problems will be solved. What's clear, though, is that solutions are more likely now that people around the world are working together on them. The guest list includes several people mentioned in this article and many more who share their goals. It also includes Dr. Tachi Yamada, president of the Gates Foundation's Global Health Program. He'll be roaming the halls, listening for "ideas so novel that people might try to shoot them down." In other words, he'll be looking for Jenners.

Meetings like this happen all the time. Even as the Clinton conference gets underway, another, more scientific group of innovators will be assembling at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for a different conference. But most of us won't be at either meeting and, for that matter, most of us don't work in global health.