Illustration./PHOTO ; Cpourtesy
After raising over $13 million for evidence-based charities amid sweeping foreign aid cuts, The Life You Can Save and Founders Pledge are transitioning from crisis response to long-term resilience.
The two global nonprofits, one dedicated to ending extreme poverty, the other empowering entrepreneurs to maximize their charitable impact, launched the Rapid Response Fund on February 17, 2025, when governments began slashing aid budgets that support critical global health and development programs.
By August 31, when the fund closed to new donations, it had raised $13.1 million for high-impact, evidence-based charities addressing urgent health and development needs.
In total, the fund awarded 13 grants to 11 partner organizations, projected to save the lives of more than 4,700 children worldwide.
“The Rapid Response Fund emphasized the importance of pairing evidence-based philanthropy with the ability to act quickly in moments of urgent need,” said Jessica La Mesa, Co-CEO of The Life You Can Save.
“As we look to the future, we see an opportunity to build on this approach by advancing models of giving that are both highly effective and adaptable to global challenges. Our goal is to continue demonstrating how strategic philanthropy can maximize impact, transform lives, and strengthen resilience for communities most in need.”
Transitioning from Crisis to Long-Term Solutions
With the fund’s emergency phase complete, both organizations are now refocusing their efforts on sustained, data-driven interventions to counter the long-term effects of shrinking public aid.
The Life You Can Save will channel donor support through its Maximize Your Impact Fund, which directs contributions to organizations working across all dimensions of poverty, from health and nutrition to education and gender equity.
The fund pools resources to support holistic, scalable solutions that create measurable change.
Founders Pledge, meanwhile, has launched the Global Health and Development (GHD) Catalytic Impact Fund, designed to target opportunities where smaller investments can unlock large-scale systemic impact.
Its first grant of $1.9 million, made jointly with the Rapid Response Fund, supports the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) in ten Sub-Saharan African countries affected by USAID cuts.
By embedding technical expertise within Ministries of Health, the initiative ensures that each dollar spent can influence hundreds more in public spending, helping governments protect critical services and sustain progress in child and maternal health.
“We’re humbled to be the first recipient of Founders Pledge’s Catalytic Impact Fund and energized by what this catalytic investment means for our ability to support governments around the world save lives now and reimagine the future of global health,” said Neil Buddy Shaw, Chief Executive Officer of CHAI.
“In a moment of unprecedented funding cuts, this partnership allowed us to act quickly to protect critical health services while helping governments revise their new health budgets to stretch every dollar further. It’s more than emergency relief, it’s an investment in resilient health systems that can save lives now and in the future.”
A Global Model for Smart Giving
Since its founding, Founders Pledge has built a network of entrepreneurs and innovators committed to effective, research-backed giving.
Coupling rigorous analysis with flexible donor platforms, it enables global philanthropy that scales impact across borders.
“The lesson of the Rapid Response Fund is clear: a community of motivated donors can transform concern into rapid, coordinated action,” said Katrina Sill, Global Health and Development Lead at Founders Pledge.
“This next chapter is about building resilient, transformational health and development systems that don’t just respond to crises, but prevent them.”
As the global aid landscape continues to shift, both The Life You Can Save and Founders Pledge are doubling down on evidence-based, transparent giving that complements rather than replaces public funding.
Their work underscores a growing reality in global development: strategic philanthropy can act as a stabilizing force when government support falters, especially in health systems across Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
By turning short-term generosity into sustained, data-driven impact, these organizations are redefining how modern philanthropy responds to the world’s most urgent and enduring challenges.
About The Life You Can Save
The Life You Can Save is a nonprofit organization promoting evidence-based, cost-effective giving to combat global poverty.
Founded to inspire and guide individuals and institutions toward philanthropy that maximizes impact, the organization curates and evaluates high-performing charities working across the full spectrum of poverty-related challenges, including health, nutrition, education, and income generation.
Through its Maximize Your Impact Fund and other targeted initiatives, The Life You Can Save directs resources to organizations proven to deliver measurable and transformative results for people living in extreme poverty.
