TOTAL
EARLY DETECTION; RAPID RESPONSE
Larry Brilliant's TED Prize Wish [2.23.06]
I
wish that you would help build a powerful new early warning system
to protect our world from some of its worst nightmares.
 |
Photo
by Jonathan Brilliant |
Introduction
by John Brockman
In
the 1970s, Larry Brilliant was
one the leaders of the successful World Health
Organization smallpox eradication program. More
than 500 million people died of smallpox in the 20th Century. Thirty
years ago, two million lives a year were still being claimed. Yet
in 1980, the disease was completely eradicated from the face of the
planet.
Brilliant
was a highlight at this year's TED (technology, entertainment, design)
Conference where he was a recipient of the 2006
TED Prize, in which the recipient makes a "wish". Among
the TED attendees are executives who run world-class companies and
have pledged support to help fulfill these wishes. This is in addition
to each winner receiving $100,000 to be spent however they choose
in support of their wishes.
The
same week, during TED, Google hired Brilliant to head Google.org.
The Foundation, which serves as the umbrella organization for Google's
philanthropic activities, is funded by 1% of the corporations stock,
or, about $1 billion. In his first act as the Executive Director
of Google.org, Brilliant said Google will join other TED attendees
to support formation of an organization to detect early signs of
emerging, global health crises, such as bird flu. The name of the
project: "The International Network System for Total Early Disease
Detection."
Below
is a link to the TED streaming video of Larry Brilliant's TED Prize acceptance speech
in which he outlines his vision for a "powerful
new early warning system to protect our world from some of its worst
nightmares".
— JB
LAWRENCE
BRILLIANT, Executive Director of Google.org. is a medical doctor
who was a professor of international health and epidemiology at the
University of Michigan from 1976-1986 and prior to that he lived
in India and worked as a medical officer for the United Nations World
Health Organization helping lead the successful effort to eradicate
smallpox. He is
a founder and a director of the Seva Foundation, an
international organization dedicated to fighting blindness.
Larry
Brilliant's Edge Bio page
TOTAL
EARLY DETECTION; RAPID RESPONSE
Lawrence Brilliant's TED Prize Wish
 
Larry
Brilliant (left) receiving TED Prize from Peter Gabriel
LARRY
BRILLIANT'S WISH: I wish that you would help build a powerful
new early warning system to protect our world from some of its
worst nightmares.
Plan
of Execution:
- The
system should be transparent, with basic information freely available
to everyone, preferably in their own language and will be independent
of any single government, any single company, any single UN agency,
but will offer its alerts, data, access to all
- Build
out team starting from existing Canadian operation (GPHIN – the
Global Public Health Information Network) which detected SARS
and other epidemics and disasters in time to help the world respond
and contain them
- Negotiate
with Canadian Government to move operations into a new non-governmental
entity (either non profit or for profit – TBD – dependent
on keeping economic self sufficiency with major employment in
Canada but with parallel system in another time zone and another
continent)
- Create
broad alliance of companies and institutions who back the idea:
the new entity will be controlled by independent board of directors
- Strong
indications of support from Kleiner Perkins, Sun, Omidyar Network,
Google and others
- Collaboration
with WHO, CDC, Health Canada, multiple universities
- Create
expert advisory boards in fields of: epidemiology, natural disasters,
industrial and environmental catastrophes, famine, human right;
this expertise will shape which indicators to prioritize
We
Are Looking For:
- A
braintrust to help identify the most useful/powerful patterns
of danger to look for
- Companies
willing to contribute the following technologies… servers,
super-computing services, hosting, telecom services, cell phones
and more
- Full-time
employees in the following areas: CEO or executive director,
fundraising, business development, epidemiology, early detection
systems
- A
PR and communications partner
- Media
partners
- Relationships
with a wide variety of other partners in multiple countries
Questions
we're still asking:
- Is
this best done as a for-profit or non-profit?
- Apart
from pandemic prevention what are the other best applications
of the service? (Drought/starvation watch? Refugee crises?
Human rights issues? Environmental issues?)
- What
are the best ways to preserve transparency and negotiate privacy
issues?
What
haven't we thought of? |
