Exhibit 048 · Archive history
The Start of Something Big: the Rockefeller Foundation's twentieth-century global fight against disease
Furthermore, the legacy of the IHD influenced the WHO in many concrete ways, especially the WHO’s Global Malaria Eradication Program, begun in 1955.
The International Health Commission was created on 27 June 1913, became the International Health Board in 1916 and the International Health Division in 1927, and was folded into the Foundation's Division of Medicine and Public Health in 1951. It started programs in more than 80 countries and by its end had allocated over $94 million. Hookworm, tuberculosis, yellow fever and malaria took 90 percent of its disease budget. The Archive states that the IHD legacy influenced the WHO's Global Malaria Eradication Program, begun in 1955. Its stated principles were that public health is a government function, that IHD aid is temporary, and that all aid should strengthen government health agencies. By 1924 hookworm campaigns had been adopted in 52 countries on six continents.
- Source
- Rockefeller Archive Center (Teresa Iacobelli)
- Date
- n.d.
- Quoted from
- Rockefeller Archive Center REsource story by Teresa Iacobelli, section "Passing the Torch"
- Grade
- Primary record
- Document
- https://resource.rockarch.org/story/the-rockefeller-foundations-20th-century-global-fight-against-disease/
- Accessed
- 2026-11-09
- Cited by
- Findings citing this exhibit