Our story

International Health Partners was founded in the UK in 2005 bridge the gap between supply and demand for healthcare products in the aftermath of disaster. Based on a North American model, our primary aim was to provide a coordinated response in Europe to increase access to medicine.  

Today, we change lives. 

We still respond to disasters, but we also support long-term health programmes and provide Essential Health Packs, full of basic medicines, to individual healthcare practitioners running medical outreach. 

We rely on the support of the UK and European healthcare industry, whose companies donate high-quality and long-dated products. We also depend on logistics providers, who help us store products and deliver them at the right time to the people who need them.

We value the alliances and organisations that fund our work. Through our annual Sharing Best Practice Workshop, conference contributions and board membership of the Partnership for Quality Medical Donations (PQMD), we contribute to raising standards for global product donation. 

From a simple idea 15 years ago, we have grown into a trusted global organisation. Overall, we have delivered more than 43 million courses of treatment to 100+ countries. In the last year alone, we sent 4.4 million treatments to 34 countries.

Our Ethos 

International Health Partners work is inspired by our Christian faith. It motivates us to care for those in vulnerable and disaster-hit communities and to give our best in all circumstances as an expression of God's love.  We believe that all people are of equal worth, regardless of gender, sexual orientation, or ethnic or religious background. For that reason, healthcare products are distributed on the basis of need alone and are provided free of charge to patients.  We place respect for others at the heart of everything we do. 

Our Christian ethos impacts the way we run our organisation.  We believe that good stewardship of resources, open decision-making and regular reporting to our supporters are essential in building trust.  We are committed to ensuring that all donated healthcare products are safely and professionally handled for the benefit of patients.  We recognise and are grateful for the contributions of others with whom we work – healthcare companies, warehousing and logistics operators and our NGO distribution partners in third countries – and are committed to respect, honesty and clarity in our partnerships.   

Our staff team begins each day with prayer together, and prayerful reflection underpins our decision making.  As our motivation and behaviour is rooted in our Christian faith, we apply an occupational requirement of Christian faith and commitment to each role on our staff team, and require the same assurance of Christian faith and commitment from our trustees and volunteers.  We are committed to diversity amongst our staff, trustees and volunteers and will not discriminate on any other grounds that are unrelated to our Christian ethos.

 

Read more about our work:

• Health programmes
• Essential Health Packs
• Logistics providers 
• Alliances

 

 

Today, for every £1 donated, we can deliver at least three in-country treatments.