GiveWell has long recognized the potential for highly cost-effective vaccine programs. We started supporting vaccination programs in 2015 and have made over $200 million in vaccination-related grants to date. For example, New Incentives, one of our Top Charities, aims to increase routine childhood vaccinations in northern Nigeria by providing small cash incentives to caregivers who bring their children into clinics for vaccinations.

Over the past several years, we’ve been growing our research team and laying the groundwork to expand the scope of our work and funding.

In this episode, GiveWell CEO and co-founder Elie Hassenfeld speaks with Natalie Crispin, who leads GiveWell’s vaccination grantmaking. They discuss how our research approach has evolved and what it means for helping more children access life-saving vaccinations.

Elie and Natalie discuss:

• Moving from finding existing programs to targeting funding gaps: In the past, GiveWell primarily looked for specific, evidence-backed program types to support—such as conditional cash transfers that incentivize vaccination. Now, with a dedicated vaccines team, we ask a bigger question: What are the bottlenecks that prevent children from getting vaccinated and how can we address them? This shift has driven our funding in areas like vaccination outreach, where teams travel to remote communities to deliver vaccines.
• Building a grantmaking portfolio to maximize learning: GiveWell recently funded several vaccination outreach programs. For example, in DRC’s Kongo Central province, where vaccination coverage rates are low, we’re supporting planning vaccination sessions (e.g. timing, frequency, location) with better data, paying community health workers to track which children need vaccines, and funding motorbikes and fuel for vaccination teams to provide vaccination near communities who are far from health facilities. This year, we hope to fund a number of additional vaccination outreach and mobile vaccination programs in differing contexts. We expect this will provide the opportunity to learn quickly about what works and help us direct future funding accordingly.
• Expanding capacity through specialization: Over the past three years, GiveWell’s research team has doubled in size and its structure has changed. Today, nearly 60 researchers work on cause-specific teams, one of which focuses on vaccination. This specialization has enabled deeper relationships with vaccination implementers, funders, and government officials—relationships that have allowed us to surface new opportunities and better understand potential funding gaps.

GiveWell’s vaccination grantmaking is a longstanding area of focus with growing diversity and impact. The deepening expertise and novel approaches of that dedicated team illustrate how the research team as a whole has evolved to pursue opportunities we wouldn’t have been able to just a few years ago. With greater capacity and specialization across health areas, we’re now better positioned to identify and direct donations to highly cost-effective programs that save and improve lives.

Visit our Top Charities Fund and All Grants Fund pages to learn more about how you can support this work, and listen or subscribe to our podcast for our latest updates.

This episode was recorded on January 22, 2026 and represents our best understanding at that time.

Most of our funding to date has supported programs in West Africa, where strong evidence gives us confidence in the effectiveness of the drug combination used. In eastern and southern Africa, malaria chemoprevention programs could potentially help many more children, but we have substantial uncertainties about drug effectiveness in that region.

In this episode, GiveWell CEO and co-founder Elie Hassenfeld speaks with Senior Researcher John Macke about the CHAMP trial, a randomized controlled trial of chemoprevention drugs we’re supporting in Malawi, and how it could shape our malaria grantmaking.

This research is one example of how GiveWell is building for the future: investing in research now that could substantially expand our ability to direct funding cost-effectively in the years ahead.

Elie and John discuss:

• Why eastern and southern Africa present different challenges: One of the drugs used in seasonal chemoprevention shows widespread resistance in the region, and existing trial evidence about the effectiveness of chemoprevention there has limitations. While we’ve supported SMC in parts of Uganda and Mozambique, we’ve been cautious about scaling up without stronger evidence on which drug combinations work and whether using certain drugs could increase resistance.
• What this trial will tell us: The trial will test three drugs alone and in different combinations across roughly 7,000 children in Malawi, making it, to our knowledge, the largest individually randomized trial of chemoprevention drugs ever conducted. We’ll learn about the efficacy of the two drugs currently used in SMC, as well as an additional drug that had previously shown resistance but might now be effective again. The trial will look at the effect of the drugs on both malaria infections and hospitalizations caused by malaria.
• How the results could affect our grantmaking: Depending on what we learn, this trial could open up more than $100 million in cost-effective funding opportunities for chemoprevention programs each year in eastern and southern Africa. The trial results will also provide a knowledge base for other funders and implementers to improve the cost-effectiveness of malaria programming. We expect initial results in mid- to late 2027, with the potential for resulting grants to provide medication to children in 2028-2029.

Visit our Top Charities Fund and All Grants Fund pages to learn more about how you can support this work, and listen or subscribe to our podcast for our latest updates.

This episode was recorded on January 22, 2026 and represents our best understanding at that time.

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Our Evolving Research Approach

For much of GiveWell’s history, finding new high-impact programs primarily meant searching through our networks—relying on referrals, long-standing partnerships, or the occasional cold outreach. But this approach had limitations. It meant that organizations doing promising work might never come across our radar, particularly in new grantmaking areas, and that capable organizations might not even know we were looking.

We’ve spent the last several years focused on growing and deepening our research team’s expertise. With a more specialized team, we’re able to more precisely articulate what we’re looking for and broaden our reach to find highly cost-effective organizations doing that work. This is just one of the many ways that our purposeful research growth is now reshaping and strengthening our work.

When we recently ran requests for proposals for vaccine outreach and water chlorination programs, we heard from hundreds of organizations, including many groups based in low- and middle-income countries that we likely wouldn’t have reached in the past. This has already led to more than a dozen pilot grants, which will help us learn what works so we can direct more funding more effectively in the years ahead.

In our latest podcast episode, GiveWell CEO and co-founder Elie Hassenfeld and Senior Program Officer Julie Faller discuss some of the ways we’ve been evolving our research team and what the resulting momentum means for the future of GiveWell’s grantmaking.

Testing Our Assumptions through Local Insights

GiveWell has built its reputation on rigorous desk research, and we’ve been enhancing that work in recent years by supplementing it with more information gathered directly from the people who live and work in the countries where we fund programs.

In this podcast episode, GiveWell CEO and co-founder Elie Hassenfeld speaks with Principal Researcher Alex Cohen about GiveWell’s work to gather local insights to check our assumptions and figure out what we might be missing.

Elie and Alex cover:

• Testing key hypotheses about the data GiveWell relies on: We’re working to improve the inputs in our decision making, including checks on coverage data, more information about how programs work in practice, and assessing whether estimated program effects are plausible.
• Addressing the limitations of global health data: We’re employing multiple approaches to build better context for the data we use, including funding independent survey firms, conducting site visits, hiring local consultants, and strengthening our network.
• Balancing the benefits of local and desk research: Desk research will continue to make up the vast majority of our work, but we believe that complementing that research with additional information we gather from local sources could meaningfully improve our grantmaking.

Grant Spotlight

Our grantmaking supports programs and research that aim to save and improve lives the most per dollar. Here’s a look at one recent example:

Where: Nigeria and India
What: Research on usage and acceptance of automated water chlorination systems
Who: Researchers at University of California, Berkeley and University of Michigan
Amount: $2.1 million
How it works: This grant will fund two main activities: (1) a pilot randomized controlled trial in two Nigerian states measuring usage rates of in-line chlorination devices, which automatically chlorinate water instead of relying on user behavior change such as adding chlorination tablets, and (2) taste preference experiments in Nigeria and India to determine optimal chlorine doses that users will accept.
Why this grant: The findings from this research will inform our future water chlorination grantmaking by providing data on device performance, optimal dosing, and infrastructure compatibility. It will also address key questions needed to assess whether a study measuring the effect of water chlorination on child mortality would be successful.
Funded by: Donations to GiveWell’s All Grants Fund

To learn more, check out the grant page.

Partner Roundup

• See Against Malaria Foundation’s 2025 impact with 21 million insecticide-treated nets distributed in nine campaigns across two countries!
• Follow a community mobilizer helping to reach under-immunized children in partnership with New Incentives’ program.
• Read about Helen Keller Intl’s new research impacting vitamin A supplementation in Côte d’Ivoire.

Comments or Questions?

We’re always looking for fresh perspectives on our research. If you have comments or questions on our work, we want to hear from you! Reach out to us at info@givewell.org.

In this episode, GiveWell CEO and co-founder Elie Hassenfeld speaks with Senior Program Officer Julie Faller about how our research approach has evolved and what it means for the future of our grantmaking.

Elie and Julie discuss:

• Launching new approaches for finding grantees: In the past, we primarily found grantees through our existing networks. We’ve recently started running requests for proposals for programs like in-line chlorination (a water treatment program) and vaccine outreach, which has allowed us to learn about and fund organizations we hadn’t previously worked with. As our research team has grown, we’ve gained expertise and the ability to articulate a clearer perspective on the kinds of programs we believe are likely to be cost-effective.
• Using a grant portfolio approach to learn more: From the hundreds of proposals we received for in-line chlorination pilot programs, we funded a portfolio of pilots across a number of African countries. Because we funded a wide range of organizations working in varying contexts with diverse program models, we’ll learn a lot very quickly and be able to apply those lessons to future funding decisions. We’re incorporating intensive monitoring and evaluation, as well as technical assistance to increase the likelihood that the pilots succeed and to maximize what we learn.
• Broadening our research funding: While GiveWell has funded research for many years, we’re now taking a broader view of the research questions and research designs we might support. For example, we recently funded a study to better understand how hemoglobin levels among anemic individuals are associated with particular health outcomes, which could improve global anemia guidelines and our funding decisions for iron fortification and supplementation programs.

This work reflects some of the outcomes of a shift several years in the making. By strategically growing and diversifying our research team, we’re building the capabilities needed to direct more donations to highly cost-effective programs and help more people in need.

Visit the All Grants Fund page to learn more about how you can support this work, and listen or subscribe to our podcast for our latest updates.

This episode was recorded on January 13, 2026 and represents our best understanding at that time.

In an effort to supplement this desk research and make better decisions, we’ve been working to gather more information directly from the people who live and work in the countries where we fund programs.

In this episode, GiveWell CEO and co-founder Elie Hassenfeld speaks with Principal Researcher Alex Cohen about GiveWell’s work to gather local insights to check our assumptions and figure out what we might be missing.

Elie and Alex discuss:

• Testing key hypotheses about the data GiveWell relies on: We’re working to improve the inputs in our decision making. This includes checks on coverage data, more information about how programs work in practice, and assessing whether estimated program effects are plausible. These efforts have already identified discrepancies between coverage surveys and other areas for improvement.
• Addressing the limitations of global health data: GiveWell depends on credible data for its research, yet global health and development data is quite limited. For example, basic measurements like child mortality rates rely on household surveys conducted only every five years. We’re employing multiple approaches to address these limits: funding independent survey firms; conducting site visits; hiring local consultants; and strengthening networks with government officials, implementing organizations, and other funders.
• Balancing the trade-offs between local work and desk research: Desk research will continue to make up the vast majority of our work. We believe that complementing that research with additional information we gather from local sources could meaningfully improve our grantmaking. We expect to dedicate around 5% of our research team’s time and around 1% of our total grantmaking to these efforts, which we believe will have an outsized impact.

By prioritizing efforts to learn from people in the places where we fund programs, we hope to better understand how programs are being implemented, identify bottlenecks, and more. We believe that incorporating this information will improve our decision-making and our work to help people as much as we can. It provides checks on our primary models, increases confidence in our conclusions, and could highlight where we might be missing something important.

Visit the All Grants Fund page to learn more about how you can support this work, and listen or subscribe to our podcast for our latest updates.

This episode was recorded on December 23, 2025 and represents our best understanding at that time.

Over the last year, GiveWell has drawn on almost two decades of cost-effectiveness research and analysis to assess the effects of this tumult in real time, identify gaps where funding could have exceptional impact, and prepare for future needs. We’ve made nearly $50 million in grants in direct response to funding cuts, as part of our expected total grantmaking of around $350 million for the year.

In our final episode of the year, GiveWell CEO and co-founder Elie Hassenfeld and Director of Research Teryn Maddox follow up on their first podcast conversation to look back at GiveWell’s response: Where did we succeed? What did we get wrong? Where could we have done better? How did our response evolve? And what might all of this mean for the world and our work in 2026?

Elie and Teryn discuss:

• Strengthening partnerships for better decision-making: GiveWell first focused on addressing urgent gaps in familiar, high-impact program areas like malaria prevention, where our existing partnerships provided timely information about programs with imminent funding needs. We also built new relationships in areas previously well-funded by the US government, such as HIV prevention and treatment, where we’d done little prior grantmaking.
• The current state of aid and emerging needs in the new year: Some funding was reinstated for certain life-saving areas like malaria prevention, but other areas faced larger cuts and future funding levels remain uncertain. In addition, changes in how aid is structured have created further ongoing uncertainty. We anticipate that needs will continue to emerge in areas like HIV prevention—particularly for key populations that may be deprioritized—even as promising new interventions become available.
• What we’ve learned and how we’re preparing for 2026: We discuss some of our successes—like funding guarantees that kept malaria prevention campaigns on track—and new modeling approaches we used. We’re drawing on lessons from that work and making learning grants in new areas, including HIV, family planning, and health systems strengthening, to position ourselves for potential future cuts.

Read our blog post to learn more about our response to this year’s aid cuts, visit the All Grants Fund page to learn more about how you can support this work, and listen or subscribe to our podcast for our latest updates.

This episode was recorded on December 16, 2025 and represents our best understanding at that time.

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GiveWell in the Media

We’re excited to share two recent media features that offer an in-depth look at GiveWell’s work. GiveWell CEO and co-founder Elie Hassenfeld joined The Ezra Klein Show to discuss our distinct approach to helping donors do the most good they can, and NPR’s Planet Money did a deep dive with our team as we researched a potential grant responding to foreign aid cuts.

The Ezra Klein Show: “The Simplest Way to Save Lives With Your Money”

Elie joined Ezra Klein, a longtime GiveWell supporter, for a conversation exploring the rigor and methodology behind the grants we make with our donors’ funds. They discuss how we weigh different program outcomes (such as lives saved versus income increased), our approach to transparency, and the value of supporting GiveWell’s evidence-based opportunities. The conversation also covers how this year’s foreign aid cuts have intensified grantmaking and includes stories from Elie’s recent visit to Malawi. The full episode is available on the New York Times website and wherever you get your podcasts.

NPR’s Planet Money: “Saving Lives with Fewer Dollars”

Planet Money followed along with our research team over several weeks as we evaluated whether to fund the Alliance for International Medical Action (ALIMA) to maintain primary healthcare and malnutrition treatment in North Cameroon following unexpected aid cuts earlier this year. The episode follows researchers Rosie Bettle, Alice Redfern, and Teryn Mattox as they work through the grant investigation and ultimately decide to approve a $1.9 million grant, filling the funding gap left by USAID for that program for one year. Listen to the full episode here.

GiveWell Conversations: “Behind the Planet Money ALIMA Grant Story”

We published an episode following up on Planet Money—diving deeper into the ALIMA grant investigation with Program Officers Rosie Bettle and Alice Redfern and discussing the grant’s timeline, our modeling approach, and what ultimately led us to make the grant.

Elie, Rosie, and Alice discuss:

• The grant investigation timeline: Due to the urgent need created by unexpected aid cuts, GiveWell completed the investigation in about six weeks from start to finish, despite this program’s wide scope.
• How we adapted our modeling: As part of evaluating this grant on a shortened timeline, GiveWell used a series of simple models—rather than one comprehensive model—to estimate cost-effectiveness.
• An update on grant progress: With GiveWell’s funding, ALIMA’s program is up and running again and is on track to treat the number of children GiveWell expected.

Growing Needs, Shrinking Aid Webinar and Follow-up

On December 4, GiveWell hosted a live webinar titled “Growing Needs, Shrinking Aid: Cost-Effective Action in a Year of Funding Cuts.” Elie moderated a panel of GiveWell researchers to discuss the effects of this year’s foreign aid funding cuts, how GiveWell is responding, and what we’re learning along the way—including our predictions and uncertainties about the future. The panelists answered questions selected live by attendees and shared their latest insights. Watch the video or listen to the audio on our podcast.

We published a follow-up blog post addressing some questions we didn’t have time to cover during the webinar, along with additional audience-submitted questions, focusing on four themes: the challenges of an uncertain future, taking action in the face of uncertainty, the role of cost-effectiveness, and future GiveWell grantmaking.

Coefficient Giving Funding Announcement

We are excited to share that Coefficient Giving, formerly Open Philanthropy, has decided to renew and increase their funding for GiveWell, committing to set aside $175 million in 2026 for opportunities we recommend.

This is great news for the people our grants help, and it comes at a critical moment. Following 2025’s aid cuts, we think needs are greater than they were a year ago, and we expect they will continue to grow in the coming years as the impacts of current and future cuts mount. We’re grateful to see donors—including Coefficient Giving—stepping up and signaling that they trust us to help in the years ahead.

End-of-Year Giving to Help People in Need

We just published our annual staff giving blog post, where GiveWell staff members share the thinking behind their personal donations for the year. Staff approaches vary widely—some give entirely to GiveWell’s funds, while others focus on causes like animal welfare, climate change, or local community needs. We hope this glimpse into our team’s personal giving is helpful as you think through your own giving decisions.

This has been a tumultuous year for global health. Early in 2025, the US government froze billions of dollars in foreign aid, affecting millions of people around the world. As part of our grantmaking this year, we expect to commit over $40 million to grants that directly address urgent needs created by the cuts—funding time-sensitive malaria campaigns, procuring essential health supplies, and supporting governments as they navigate the uncertainty. With fewer resources going to global health and development programs, we believe giving now has greater potential impact than before the cuts. You can help us respond to an uncertain future for global health by supporting the giving fund that best matches your giving preferences.

If you’re planning to give this holiday season, a few reminders:

• We recommend using our online donation form to donate via ACH, credit card, PayPal, Google Pay, or Apple Pay whenever possible.
• If you’re concerned with 2025 tax deductibility, check the charitable tax donation deadlines, and be sure to consider holidays and weekends to ensure adequate processing time.
• If we can help with your end-of-year giving in any way, please reach out to info@givewell.org.

Other helpful resources for your giving season:

• Information About Donating
• Charitable Tax Donation Deadlines for 2025 (US donors)
• Global Tax Deductibility Guidelines
• Making a Donation of Cryptocurrency to GiveWell

We’re deeply grateful for your support and wish you a wonderful holiday season!

Grant Spotlight

Our grantmaking supports programs and research that aim to save and improve lives the most per dollar. Here’s a look at one recent example:

Where: Democratic Republic of the Congo, Madagascar, Nigeria
What: A three-month qualitative assessment of how US government funding cuts are impacting key parts of the vaccine delivery system
Who: Results for Development (R4D)
Amount: $271,445
How it works: This research addresses a critical lack of on-the-ground information about the real-world consequences of this year’s US government funding cuts on vaccine delivery, including the effects on vaccinators and healthcare workers, outreach sessions, supply chains, and data systems.
Why this grant: The findings will inform GiveWell’s vaccines strategy by providing qualitative updates to help us manage existing grants and prioritize future funding. R4D’s facility-level data collection offers critical insights that would be difficult for GiveWell to access otherwise.
Funded by: Donations to GiveWell’s All Grants Fund

To learn more, check out the grant page.

Partner Roundup

• Read why all four of GiveWell’s Top Charities are promoted in Vox’s Giving Tuesday Guide.
• Celebrate Malaria Consortium’s 2025 impact, including over 100 million courses of SMC medicines distributed and over 22.5 million children reached!
• See how one vaccination clinic staff member ensures his remote clinic stays stocked with life-saving vaccines as part of New Incentives’ program.

Comments or Questions?

We’re always looking for fresh perspectives on our research. If you have comments or questions on our work, we want to hear from you! Reach out to us at info@givewell.org.

This is great news for the people our grants help, and it comes at a critical moment. Following 2025’s aid cuts, we think needs are greater than they were a year ago, and we expect they will continue to grow in the coming years as the impacts of current and future cuts mount. We’re grateful to see donors—including Coefficient Giving—stepping up and signaling that they trust us to help in the years ahead.

We think donating now to our Giving Funds remains an excellent way to help people in need, and we’re actively seeking donors who want to be part of this moment of substantial need and opportunity. Every dollar you give will be put to work, saving and improving lives through the most cost-effective programs our research identifies.

Growing Our Impact

Last year, we raised $415 million and directed $397 million. This new commitment from Coefficient Giving, combined with recent updates from other donors, will make a real difference in the amount of funding we use to help people over the next few years.

The decision by Coefficient Giving’s board to set aside funds in 2026 for GiveWell’s recommendations was approved on December 8, and the details were finalized several days later. In line with our core value of transparency, we’re sharing the news through this post quickly and before we’ve fully developed our plans.

We last updated our cost-effectiveness threshold for funding in November to 8x our benchmark. While we don’t currently plan to make additional changes, we do think there are many excellent opportunities that sit both below and above our high bar, and we are always evaluating where we should set it.

Over the past several years, we have been investing in our team and research capacity. This new funding means we will need to significantly accelerate this effort as we continue to grow our team and evolve to operate our distinctive research and grantmaking process at an even larger scale.

As just one example of our recent progress, GiveWell’s research team has more than doubled in size over the past four years, and we have nearly tripled the number of senior research staff. Because of the increased breadth and depth of our team, we are now able to evaluate programs that a few years ago we didn’t have the capacity to, and we can do a better job directing money to where it will help people in need around the world.

Coefficient Giving’s Support

In the announcement they posted today, Coefficient Giving expressed excitement about renewing their support and indicated that they expect to provide substantial additional funding in future years, saying, “We think [GiveWell is] an outstanding resource, and we’re proud to support the high-impact organizations they’ve identified.”

Coefficient Giving and GiveWell are longtime partners. Coefficient Giving originated as a project within GiveWell and then became an independent organization, until recently called Open Philanthropy. We work together closely, discussing research questions of mutual interest and sometimes engaging in ​​joint evaluations of funding opportunities. We also support and advise a number of shared donors.

When Coefficient Giving announced their previous commitment in 2023, we did not think their support would continue past 2025. According to their announcement, their renewed commitment is based in part on:

• Coefficient Giving’s re-evaluation of the cost-effectiveness threshold of GiveWell’s recommendations. They now estimate this threshold is about the same for GiveWell’s recommendations and Coefficient Giving’s other global health opportunities.
• Increased available assets from Good Ventures, Coefficient Giving’s largest funder, and Good Ventures’ desire to spend their assets more quickly.

Since Coefficient Giving’s inception, they have been supporters of GiveWell’s work, and the commitment of $175 million for next year is roughly in line with their past support. With this renewal, Coefficient Giving anticipates that GiveWell’s recommendations will likely represent a little over 10% of their 2026 giving. The chart below shows funds raised by GiveWell during previous metrics years (February 1 to January 31) and the proportion from Coefficient Giving.

Accelerating into 2026

We look forward to using this funding from Coefficient Giving, and that entrusted to us by tens of thousands of other donors this year, to help people in need as much as we can. While it represents a large increase in our near-term grantmaking capacity, global health needs are enormous—far exceeding the available funding.

We’ll be continuing the push to increase our fundraising, better communicate about our work, scale our capacity to deploy more cost-effective grants quickly, and help more people in the coming years. If you want to be a part of that mission to do the most good we can, we invite you to donate or reach out with questions about how we can help with your giving.

You can click the links to jump to a staff member’s entry: Araceli Steger, Calum Best, Devin Jacob, Elie Hassenfeld, Jeremy Rehwaldt, Kameron Smith, Katie Skoff, Lauren Imholte, Lisa McCandless, Lucy McNamara, Maggie Lloydhauser, Matthew Kertman, Paige Henchen, Sai Jahann, Sarah Eustis-Guthrie, Tori Shepard, Teryn Mattox.

Araceli Steger (Head of People)

My family’s giving increased this year, both locally (in the Chicago area) and globally. We continued our contributions to organizations we have personal experiences with, particularly in our local community, organizations our family and friends are close to, and organizations that support those impacted by government shifts. We increased our contribution to GiveWell’s All Grants Fund as a result of seeing the impact of our team’s work firsthand; I love demonstrating my support for our work beyond my employment and I am proud to work at an organization that is committed to doing good in the world.

Calum Best (Chief of Staff)

About 80% of my annual giving went to charities that promote the wellbeing of non-human animals:

• Animal Charity Evaluators funds charities that decrease the suffering of farmed animals.
• The Good Food Institute tries to speed up the development of alternative proteins, pushing the world toward a food system that’s less reliant on farmed animals.

I’ve distributed the remaining 20% in small donations to a few organizations that are working on technical research, policy initiatives, and education to make the development of transformative AI technology less risky.

I also signed the 10% Pledge this year after paying down some debt and thinking through a few personal concerns about making a long-term financial commitment. If you’re considering the pledge and want to talk through your hesitations, let me know—I’d be happy to chat!

Devin Jacob (Data and Technology Project Manager)

My charitable donations in the past year have been a bit scattershot. Despite working at GiveWell for many years, over time I have done less to optimize or track my individual donations. I now prefer to give as the impulse arises. I have several active monthly donations, ensuring a baseline of giving to causes and programs I support, but I don’t track my giving carefully and am not particularly strategic about it.

A lot of the money I have donated in the past year has gone to groups working to support immigrants and refugees. I am unaware of any rigorous attempts to measure the efficacy of the various organizations working in this area so I can’t make a strong case for why the specific groups I donate to stand out, but organizations I have donated to in the past year doing this kind of work include International Refugee Assistance Project and Immigrant Defenders Law Center. I also made smaller contributions to several other organizations in 2025. I estimate that these donations represent about 40% of my overall giving.

As in previous years, I have made contributions to nonprofit news/media organizations including Wikimedia, Calmatters, and Reveal. Combined these donations are likely about 20% of my giving. I also always give some money to GiveWell supported organizations and plan to make at least one larger donation this December, likely an unrestricted donation though I have not made up my mind at this time. In addition to donations to registered nonprofits, I have also made it a habit to give money directly to people in my community in need of financial support. I have made those contributions via platforms such as GoFundMe as well as in cash to people I meet in the course of my daily life in New York. This last category probably represents about 20% of my overall giving. I also give a small amount to a local animal shelter that runs spay and neuter programs in my neighborhood.

Elie Hassenfeld (CEO)

This year, my family is planning to give 80% of our annual donation to GiveWell’s All Grants Fund, 10% to The Humane League, and 10% to GiveDirectly.

We’re giving to GiveWell’s All Grants Fund because it gives GiveWell the most flexibility to direct funds where we (GiveWell staff) think they will do the most good. This may mean supporting programs at Top Charities, but it could mean funding newer organizations, research, or more speculative opportunities that are high (expected) impact. I am very excited about the potential impact of the grantmaking opportunities we’re finding.

Factory farming inflicts enormous unnecessary and preventable suffering. Although I have chosen to prioritize human welfare in my career and my giving, I also believe that animal welfare is an important and neglected cause area, so we will allocate some of our donations to the Humane League.

Finally, we are giving to GiveDirectly, as we have in previous years. I continue to believe that GiveDirectly plays a critical role in providing a highly legible, transparent, and straightforward opportunity to help people in low-income countries.

Jeremy Rehwaldt (Senior Communications Specialist)

Each year I give a percentage of my annual income to nonprofit organizations. I’m doing that in part because I hope that my giving will make a tiny difference in improving global well-being and in part because it reminds me to live more simply and sustainably. I have much more than I need, and much more than most people alive today. My giving for 2025 is divided into three categories:

• About 70% of my giving goes to advocacy organizations aimed at systemic change. Most of that giving is through Grassroots International, which regrants my donations to grassroots organizations seeking transformational change, many led by women of color. It feels valuable to me, as a person with many forms of privilege, to take steps toward sharing the power I have; this is one very small step I can take.
• About 20% goes to organizations working to mitigate climate change (the majority of my giving is to the Giving Green Fund, which looks for evidence-based climate solutions). I am concerned about the likelihood of increasingly severe and long-lasting harm from climate change, especially on the most vulnerable.
• About 10% goes to GiveWell’s All Grants Fund. I am very confident in GiveWell’s research and grant recommendations, and I know that my donation—and my everyday work—will have a meaningful impact.

Kameron Smith (Commons Coordinator)

In past years, I’ve split my giving between GiveWell’s All Grants Fund and causes outside our scope, including political campaigns, civil rights organizations, and climate initiatives. I give monthly to GiveWell and historically made additional ad-hoc donations to these other areas.

This year I’m consolidating my giving. Between work and personal commitments, I haven’t had the bandwidth to properly research and evaluate organizations in those other areas, and recent policy shifts–particularly the defunding of USAID–have created urgent, additional need in global health and development. Given both the increased funding gaps and my own capacity constraints, I’m directing my full giving budget to GiveWell’s All Grants Fund this year. I believe it’s the highest impact choice I can make right now and the most sustainable one for me personally.

Katie Skoff (Program Associate, Cross-cutting)

When I was in college, I planned to donate a portion of my income after graduation, but actually doing it was harder than I expected. This year, two years after graduating, I’m really happy to have started donating 10% of my income, primarily to GiveWell’s All Grants Fund. A big reason I finally took this step was hearing time and again that others who already do this find it gratifying and manageable, rather than a burden. Our staff giving post was a big part of that, and I’m grateful to be part of it this year.

My decision to donate was reinforced when I traveled to Uganda for a site visit. I sat down with mothers who spoke passionately about what they do to keep their children healthy and the challenges they face working to that end. Our conversation made me grateful that I have the means and opportunity to donate to programs I’m confident will have an impact on others’ lives, including people like the women and children I met.

Lauren Imholte (Senior Manager, Philanthropy)

We’re giving to two places this year: our local public media station and GiveWell’s All Grants Fund.

Public media is something we rely on regularly—we’d miss it if it weren’t there, and we think people in the U.S. are better off with it than without it. Sticking with the All Grants Fund is an easy choice for us: we trust GiveWell’s research and want our donation to go where it can do the most good. I feel fortunate to work at GiveWell and have extremely high confidence in the impact of my giving.

This combination of something close to home and something with global reach is where we usually land.

Lisa McCandless (Head of Philanthropy)

I’ve spent my career in global health and development because it’s where I feel I can have the most impact. I’ve seen firsthand how big the gaps can be between high- and low-impact programs, and how hard it is to deliver real impact well. I followed GiveWell for over a decade before joining last year, and I continue to be inspired by the rigor and results of our work. I believe GiveWell offers one of the most reliable, effective ways for donors to save and improve lives, and I see my day-to-day work as my main contribution to that impact right now.

This year, my family gave directly to a few global health and development organizations that were affected by aid cuts, guided by my trust in their leaders and how they do their work. We’re also giving locally, mainly to a housing and food assistance nonprofit and to my son’s public school, where more than a third of students come from low-income families. I see these gifts as a way to show up for our community, rather than as impact-maximizing donations.

This is also the first year we’ve given our first grader a weekly allowance and intentionally built in a “give” portion. Inspired by Ron Lieber, we split the allowance into three jars—spend, save, and give. When his giving jar fills up, our son decides where it goes. So far, he’s chosen to support endangered animals, saying, “You already help kids get medicine and other things they need through your work, so I want to help animals.” It’s been meaningful to watch him learn to think about giving and generosity in his own way, and I hope it becomes a lifelong habit.

Lucy McNamara (Senior Researcher)

Although I just joined the GiveWell team this year, my husband and I are long-time GiveWell donors. This year, we decided to switch our monthly donation from the Top Charities Fund to the All Grants Fund. We made this decision because since joining GiveWell, I’ve been so excited about many of the grants I’ve seen come through that will be funded through the All Grants Fund, including grants that will help backstop gaps left by the dismantling of USAID.

In addition to our monthly GiveWell donation that accounts for ~60% of our giving, this year we have also given to:

• Democracy Forward Foundation (30%) to protect democracy in the US.
• Giving Green (5%) – which I think of as “like GiveWell but for climate change.” (We specifically donate to their Giving Green Fund.)
• Doctors Without Borders (MSF) (5%). I worked alongside MSF a number of times in my former career at CDC, including during the 2014–2015 West Africa Ebola epidemic. I was consistently impressed both with their lifesaving work on the ground and their influence on country and global health policy.

We also made some smaller donations this year (e.g., to a friend’s kickstarter to create an animated show to promote public health education), and will likely make additional donations to local organizations for the holidays as gifts for family members.

Maggie Lloydhauser (Senior Philanthropy Advisor)

This year, the American health system poured tremendous resources into saving my best friend’s life; as a result, we can safely assume she will go on to live a long life in good health, despite nearly dying, twice, from a complicated illness. Like anyone who has been helpless in the face of a loved one’s health crisis, I would have paid anything to save her life. Luckily, money wasn’t the barrier in her case.

For so many others around the world, money is the barrier. As a result, lots of people die, even from conditions that are relatively inexpensive to prevent and treat. My husband and I wish to live in a world where no one dies because they don’t have access to the resources they need. In the spirit of that wish, we increased our giving this year. We also opened a donor-advised fund, which we funded with several years of giving and will draw down to smooth our giving over time.

My giving continues to be fueled by inspiring conversations I have (by virtue of my job) with people who donate with great generosity, consistency, and passion. The certainty I feel about increasing my giving this year is thanks, in large part, to ongoing conversations with donors who deeply live their values.

In terms of allocation:

• 90% of our gifts this year will go to GiveWell’s All Grants Fund. I’m proud of the work of my colleagues on the research team; there is nobody I trust more to make careful decisions on how to do meaningful good with my family’s funds.
• We’re giving 10% locally, where many families face hunger and other serious barriers to quality of life.

Matthew Kertman (Communications Strategist)

The organizations my family supports with our giving reflect our shared values and have remained fairly consistent over the years. We’ve generally given more as our household income has grown, but it’s also varied with the arrival of our children and as we’ve navigated life’s challenges. I hope to be able to commit to the Giving What We Can pledge this year.

When I think about my giving, I often consider two intersecting spectrums: need and time. On the first, is the organization addressing an essential human need or a structural cause? On the second, is the work happening now or over a longer time horizon? How I give in response to this isn’t static, and my strategy has shifted over time. Here’s how I’m thinking about it this year.

• Direct Service. I’ve spent parts of my career at small-to-medium sized non-profit organizations that deliver direct services to people in need. I’ve watched donations turn into meals for hungry American families and talked to Ugandan communities who used cash to address shared needs like clean water. This has shaped my perspective on charitable giving.

  While the impact of my donation is greater in low- and middle-income countries, I support both domestic and international organizations that help meet immediate needs, especially for families. I appreciate that GiveDirectly works in both contexts. With local non-profits, I aim to give monthly donations instead of a larger, single gift because reliable, recurring support can be instrumental to their impact.

• Structural. Because of my journalism background, I am biased toward a theory of progress that privileges human connection. You could call this a “facts matter, but stories motivate” approach. I support this view by donating to our local public media stations, ProPublica, and other organizations that uphold the fourth estate.

  As a parent, I’m thinking more about what I can do to ensure our children grow into a healthy planet. One way I’m pursuing this is by donating to the Giving Green Fund this year. While many strategies combating climate change are difficult to measure with a GiveWell-style approach, I feel confident that giving here supports highly effective work.

• Volunteering. Volunteering is another way to give. Although less cost-effective, my sense is that giving time has knock-on effects beyond the immediate cause, particularly by cultivating third spaces that strengthen communities and, for our kids, providing a tangible connection to the value of helping others. We participate in trash clean-ups around our neighborhood with our oldest, and will do so again this year.

Paige Henchen (Chief of Staff)

This year I’m again giving the majority of my annual charitable giving (80%) to GiveWell. I’m a longtime donor, having made my first donation to GiveWell in 2011. I just had my two-year anniversary of working at GiveWell, and I feel more passionate about our work than ever. In particular, I have a deeper appreciation for our deep commitment to the values of truthseeking and transparency, which I think is exceptional. I’ve also been deeply proud to see how our team has navigated the challenges of the global health landscape this year.

For my GiveWell donations, I give unrestricted. It’s helpful for GiveWell to have its operating support spread across many donors, because we cap the amount of our operating expenses that can come from any one donor (what we call the “single donor cap”). For me, giving unrestricted also represents an endorsement of the GiveWell “project” and the indirect benefits of e.g., publishing our research for anyone to look at. I expect that a large portion of what I give to GiveWell’s Unrestricted Fund will eventually be disbursed via grants to other organizations thanks to our excess assets policy.

Most of the remainder (19%) went to a few other organizations working in global wellbeing or effective altruism: Delta Education Collective in Uganda; GiveDirectly; Rethink Priorities; Good Food Institute; and Spiro. I also have made a number of small gifts to things like my child’s school fundraiser. Finally, I make direct donations to political campaigns. I mentally account for political giving as a separate category from charitable giving.

Sai Jahann (General Counsel)

I donate +/- 10% of my pre-tax income each year to charitable causes. (I use charitable broadly, to include some organizations and projects that do not qualify for tax exemption.) The majority of my charitable giving is structured as recurring monthly donations, rather than annual gifts. I do this because I heard once that it was better for the charities themselves to have predictable recurring donations, and when I implemented this practice, I realized it was easier for me, too.

Looking at where my donations actually go, I see that my charitable giving aligns to four main pillars:

• Open source or public services that are donor-supported (Cityside Journalism, Wikimedia Foundation). I use these resources myself, and I want them to continue to exist in the world with the independence that comes from having a diverse base of donor support.
• Causes that are personally and/or politically meaningful for me, including immigrants’ rights, humane treatment of animals farmed for food, and personal bodily autonomy (The Humane League, RAICES, United Farm Workers Foundation, Reproductive Freedom for All). A significant portion of my annual giving is in support of non-charitable political activity, including donations to candidates running for office (in the public interest, in my opinion!).
• Organizations addressing chronic needs within my community, primarily shelter and food (food banks in Alameda and Contra Costa counties, Larkin Street Youth Services, St. Vincent de Paul Society, and CA YIMBY). As a person of relative privilege in my community, I feel an obligation to help other community members who are most in need – both via direct support, and through advocacy that can help improve conditions for the future.
• Highly effective organizations and projects that help people in extreme poverty, entirely outside the United States (GiveDirectly, The Fistula Foundation). I believe very strongly in GiveWell’s mission, and I contribute to that work through my day-to-day service for the organization. If/when I’m no longer a GiveWell employee, I’ll be honored to become a recurring unrestricted donor supporting GiveWell and the amazingly cost-effective opportunities we find and fund.

If a friend or family member is raising money for a cause they believe strongly in, or that has impacted their life (or the life of a loved one), or if a member of my community is in need of acute financial support – unless I find the cause personally or politically abhorrent (a high bar) – I will contribute. I think community is really great, and mutual aid and support is a contributor to strong, self-sustaining communities.

Finally, each year during the Giving Season, I look for opportunities to provide timely support to organizations doing critical work. Sometimes these ad-hoc gifts turn into recurring gifts, which is also nice! This year I am donating to World Central Kitchen, Friends of Oakland Animal Services, and my local NPR affiliate, KQED.

Sarah Eustis-Guthrie (Senior Program Associate)

Over the past year, I’ve seen how the US government’s aid cuts have forced life-saving programs to close their doors. Supporting these programs feels more urgent than ever. Working at GiveWell has deepened my confidence that evidence-based giving is one of the best ways to help people in need: we have strong evidence that particular interventions really do save lives, and it takes careful research to identify those interventions. This year, I’m supporting several newer organizations in the Charity Entrepreneurship network implementing evidence-based interventions to save and improve the lives of humans and animals. Donations to recently launched organizations can be particularly impactful, as young organizations typically find it more challenging to find support.

Tori Shepard (Salesforce Administrator)

I donate to GiveWell and Animal Charity Evaluators (ACE) on a monthly basis. I resonate with organizations like GiveWell and ACE that take a rigorous, research-based approach to doing good, because I think meaningfully helping others is difficult and nuanced (and of course, very worthy of that effort). After the USAID cuts, I increased my GiveWell donation and moved the allocation to All Grants Fund, to support the flexibility of GiveWell’s response. Additionally, when a major crisis occurs, I feel moved to support people’s recovery, but am often unsure how to do that impactfully. So this year, I started another monthly gift to the Center for Disaster Philanthropy.

Teryn Mattox (Director of Research)

My family’s giving this year is going to largely the same organizations as in previous years so the below is slightly updated from last year’s post: I am extremely fortunate to have the opportunity to make the world a better place through both my day-to-day work and my charitable giving.

I am so proud of and excited by the work we do at GiveWell, and I think the All Grants Fund is one of the best ways donors can save and improve human lives with their money.

My family also strongly weighs the welfare of animals in the moral calculus that drives our giving. Since I joined GiveWell, we’ve transitioned all of our significant giving to organizations promoting farmed animal welfare. I feel comfortable with this allocation given the amount of time and energy I devote in my day-to-day work to furthering GiveWell’s work improving the lives of the global poor.

The reason we feel compelled to do this is based on the intensity of the suffering inflicted upon farmed animals, the staggering numbers of factory-farmed animals alive at any given moment, the potential impact of our donations in reducing this suffering, and our beliefs about the importance of animal suffering.

We’ve given to a variety of organizations identified by the Effective Altruism Animal Welfare Fund or by Animal Charity Evaluators. We also have a number of small, recurring monthly donations that we don’t consider part of our core giving, but are more like extra “fun money” we spend to support our local community in Oregon.

Because of limited time, we were unable to answer all of the questions live. Below we’ve answered some of the questions that weren’t addressed during the webinar, along with some additional questions submitted by audience members, focusing on four themes:

• The challenges of an uncertain future
• Taking action in the face of uncertainty
• The role of cost-effectiveness
• Future GiveWell grantmaking

The challenges of an uncertain future

What is the biggest impact of the cuts you have seen in your research area?

Meika Ball: My work has focused on health systems strengthening, which are interventions that strengthen the foundational systems and processes needed to deliver health services, such as supply chain management, data systems, and health financing. Health systems strengthening is a new area for GiveWell. We prioritized it this year largely because a lot of this work had lost funding after previously being supported by the US government and other donors.

We have consistently heard about large cuts to this work, though the full magnitude has been challenging to understand. Especially during the stop-work order, we heard about countries losing access to their own data systems, health supplies being stuck at various points in the supply chain, and staff being laid off. This loss of staff capacity was especially evident during our team’s recent trip to Zambia. Officials in one province told us they had lost funding for around half of their staff. Community-based outreach work, where health worker stipends had been cut, was also impacted.

Because various components and processes within health systems underlie many other health programs, the cuts to health systems have been particularly challenging. I think strengthening health systems, including support for health workers, is likely to be a substantial need in the future as governments face more limited budgets.

Could you share more about the data challenges arising from funding cuts and provide an example of how it is impacting your work?

Dilhan Perera: Understanding the impact of changes to US government funding for HIV services has been very challenging. Many programs halted by the stop-work order were eventually terminated, but others were resumed—and sometimes revised or expanded to cover gaps left by the terminated programs for lifesaving services. In addition, some people who were accessing services through terminated programs may have found other ways to access similar services, such as through government-funded health facilities. On the other hand, barriers like stigma may have prevented some people from going to those facilities.

Data from President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), the US government’s initiative to combat HIV, used to be released quarterly with information about service delivery across all of the programs and clinics PEPFAR supported. Data for 2025 has not yet been made available, and there’s no timeline for when the data might be released. Moreover, funding disruptions impacted the capacity of some programs to continue collecting accurate data about service provision. As a result, we do not have a clear picture of to what extent reductions and resumptions in US-funded HIV programs translated into a reduction in service delivery or of which geographies and populations have been most affected.
All of this has made it difficult to know which places and groups have lost access to health services and to evaluate how cost-effective it would be to provide new funding or reinstate funding for terminated programs.

Taking action in the face of uncertainty

What was the most impactful action you took this year to respond to cuts?

Rosie Bettle: Let me speak specifically to our actions in response to malaria treatment needs, rather than to the most impactful actions of GiveWell as a whole. As a result of the cuts, some countries have been running alarmingly low on essential malaria supplies. These include rapid dual tests, or RDTs, which are the test kits used to diagnose malaria; artemisinin-based combination therapies, or ACTs, which are the standard first-line treatment for malaria infection; and artesunate which is specifically for severe malaria cases.

Normally, organizations funded by USAID, like the President’s Malaria Initiative (PMI), order these supplies from manufacturers and ship them to countries in need. This process typically takes about six months from when an order is placed to when it arrives in the country. But when PMI was put on a stop-work order, many orders were severely delayed.

We worked closely with the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI), who tracks how much stock countries have left and how quickly they’re using it up, and we started seeing evidence that countries were about to run out of these life-saving medicines. Our rapid response research team made five grants to tackle these shortages. We funded organizations like CHAI and PATH to procure supplies directly from manufacturers on an emergency basis and ship them very quickly to countries facing gaps caused by the delays.

We think that the work we funded through CHAI helped prevent a national stockout of ACTs in Malawi, although it’s always difficult to work out what would have happened in the counterfactual. We also think this work shortened a national-level stockout of RDTs in Nigeria. We also estimate that we reduced periods of extremely low stock—which we think leads to increased clinic-level stockouts during which patients show up at local health facilities and aren’t able to be tested or treated—for severe malaria treatment in Mozambique and for RDTs in Senegal.

What expertise proved most valuable this year, and where did you most need to adapt?

Alex Bowles: Uncertainty about what other funders are planning and doing has been a key challenge this year. There has been a substantial risk that we would either miss urgent cost-effective funding gaps or would fill funding gaps that ultimately would have been filled by another funder.

The effort we’ve put over the last couple of years into building our networks among others working on malaria prevention and treatment has paid dividends. Our partners—other funders like the Global Fund as well as grantees and other implementers like PATH, Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI), Against Malaria Foundation, and Malaria Consortium—were able to share information with us quickly. We want to be sure the work we’re supporting, whether that’s seasonal malaria chemoprevention campaigns or net durability surveys that lost funding, wouldn’t have funding replaced by another funder, and our networks have been an important source of information about this.

In terms of adaptation, we have had to look into areas where we have a less substantial history of grantmaking. For example, we’ve done a lot of work on insecticide-treated net campaigns to prevent malaria, but we have provided less funding in the past for malaria treatment supplies, where we found a number of urgent time-sensitive funding gaps, so we had to learn quickly there.

We have expertise—and our grantees have even more—that was really useful for allowing us to act quickly but carefully this year. We are very used to making hard choices between options when there are too many gaps to fill. We are now trying to build that understanding across a range of areas that may now need funding, due either to the funding cuts or to the emergence of new technologies, such as spatial emanators.

The role of cost-effectiveness

What are the biggest questions for cost-effectiveness caused by this rapidly changing environment?

Rosie Bettle: One key question is understanding how the funding landscape is changing. Before, it felt like we had a decent sense of what other funders were going to support and therefore where our funding could be most additive. Now, we don’t know exactly where the gaps are going to be. We’re trying to make educated estimates based on our experience in these sectors and on what we’re hearing from other stakeholders, but there’s still a lot of uncertainty. The changing funding landscape also gives us uncertainty around whether the “systems” that our grantees rely upon will still be functional. Global health programs are highly interconnected and rely on a range of health systems to carry out their work, and we’re uncertain about the impact of cuts on those systems. For example, we might be funding an implementer to distribute ready-to-use therapeutic food (RUTF) to treat malnutrition in Cameroon, but that distribution depends on a functional supply chain bringing RUTF into Cameroon. Some of those systems are USAID funded, so we have a lot of questions about whether they will continue functioning and how we ought to respond to keep the most vital platforms going.

Additionally, we’ve seen an increase in time-sensitive grants, so we’re working to estimate the cost-effectiveness of a given grant quickly while maintaining research rigor. For some grants to fill gaps in malaria treatment supplies, we needed to make a decision within one week, much faster than our usual months-long process, which has led us to explore new methods. For example, in some cases we are using multiple simple models to triangulate a program’s cost-effectiveness rather than one complex model. We’ve also built out our network so we can more quickly check in with experts, program implementers, and other stakeholders.

How is GiveWell balancing and addressing cost-effectiveness and immediate needs with long-term sustainability and systems change?

Meika Ball: While we have experienced some tensions in our work over the past year, they haven’t necessarily been between cost-effectiveness and systems change—for example, we believe there may be cost-effective opportunities to improve health systems. I think one important tension we have seen is around the level of uncertainty we are comfortable accepting in the grants we fund.

Historically, evaluating health systems strengthening work has been difficult for GiveWell because there is more limited evidence on health outcomes than for many other areas we support. It’s unlikely we’ll be as confident about the impact of health systems strengthening interventions as we are about, for example, insecticide-treated nets, just because the evidence base is less robust—it’s hard to run a randomized trial on national-level health systems interventions!

A key challenge for GiveWell when evaluating these grants is estimating the likelihood that a program’s impact will be sustained in the long term. However, if these programs can be sustained over the long term, or lead to enduring systems change (and the benefits therefore happen over a long period of time), we think they could plausibly be very cost-effective. This is one of the reasons we have focused on learning more about health systems strengthening this year.

Given our uncertainties, we are trying to think about how to embed learning into grants wherever possible, rather than treating research and programmatic work as separate. We’re looking for opportunities where we can fund implementation and then bolster program monitoring or add additional evaluations. We hope this will enable us to respond to time-sensitive needs while also generating the evidence that will help us and others make better decisions going forward. We are also thinking more about whether we can learn about the ongoing benefits of some programs after the grant period ends. One example of this would be funding data collection to assess coverage after a technical assistance program has concluded.

Overall, we expect to make health systems strengthening grants we think are highly cost-effective, but these will inherently be less certain than grants we make to other programs that have a stronger evidence base and are easier to measure. Our goal is to build in sufficient opportunities to learn more so we can update our understanding over time and have a more informed view of the long-term sustainability of some of the programs we support.

Future GiveWell grantmaking

How do you think GiveWell’s grantmaking pace might change in 2026?

Dilhan Perera: I’ll focus on grantmaking in one particular area: HIV prevention and treatment. When the US aid freeze hit earlier this year, there were a number of previously well-funded areas, including HIV, that looked like they might have large funding gaps. Because they had previously been well-funded, GiveWell hadn’t spent much time evaluating them. So in addition to the challenge of learning what funding had been cut and how those cuts were impacting health service delivery, we also had a lot to learn about these cause areas and how cost-effective interventions within them might be (including how cost-effectiveness has changed since we last briefly considered them). We devoted substantial time to this effort in 2025.

Because we’ve now done a lot more of this background work, we are better positioned to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of specific funding opportunities in 2026. For example, we’ve been updating our cost-effectiveness models for both HIV treatment and HIV prevention interventions, so we’ll be able to assess whether specific grants focused on these interventions look cost-effective enough for us to recommend funding. I expect this will also allow us to increase the pace of our grantmaking—or at least the pace of our decision making, which includes decisions to decline funding.

Aid cuts have created more uncertainty than before. What strategies are you using to navigate this, and how is this impacting your grantmaking process?

Alex Bowles: We’re taking a number of steps to deal with the substantial uncertainty that continues to affect health and development programs. First, we’re leaning into our networks. We’d like to ensure that where there’s good information, we’re aware of it. This means making sure we are connecting with the right people, attending the right meetings, and even subscribing to the right mailing lists!

Second, we’re becoming more tolerant of unavoidable uncertainty. In some cases, there will be uncertainties that aren’t currently resolvable—like how much the US government will spend on malaria programs in 2027. Sometimes these will affect our cost-effectiveness estimates, but we can’t let these wider ranges of uncertainty prevent us from making good grants.

Third, we need to be thinking hard about the biggest uncertainties in a grant investigation—they might be different than those we had before the cuts. In many cases we’re placing relatively more importance on addressing big-picture qualitative questions—for example, “Is this country likely to dramatically change its malaria strategy because of cuts?”—and less on the details of individual parameters in our cost-effectiveness analyses, ones that are unlikely to sway our decisions and where we generally already have solid research.

And finally, uncertainty is pushing us to continue our efforts to learn from our implementation grants rather than focusing all our learning before a grant decision. This could be as intensive as adding a randomized evaluation of a program component or as light-touch as making clear and verifiable predictions about what will happen so we can go back later to see if we were right.