This book is an interconnected history of the evolution of global health in the decades before 2019, told through the prism of six decisive moments in which individuals from the World Health Organisation, philanthropic foundations, academia and bilateral agencies came together to shape the world.

Conrad Keating is the Writer-in-Residence and Visiting Professor at the School of Medicine, Trinity College Dublin. He works on the social history of medicine and the history of science and was previously the Writer-in-Residence at the Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine at the University of Oxford. His most recent publication is the widely acclaimed Anthony Cerami: A Life in Translational Medicine (2021). Previous work includes Kenneth Warren and the Great Neglected Diseases of Mankind Programme: The Transformation of Geographical Medicine in the US and Beyond (2017); Great Medical Discoveries: An Oxford Story (2013); and Smoking Kills: The Revolutionary Life of Richard Doll (2009). Keating has an ongoing ten-part Art of Medicine essay series on the history of randomised controlled trials in The Lancet.

Introduction: Decisive Moments in Global Health and the Life of a Medical Scientist 1. The Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases (TDR) 2. River Blindness and the Ivermectin Story 3. The Fall and Rise of Malaria 4. GAVI: The Vaccine Alliance in the 21st Century 5. Maternal and Child Health: The Great Leap Forward 6. How Ebola Created the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) Epilogue