This is a follow up to the previous one where we defined the question. Read that first
Can I make a direct life saving impact to someone, where my action, with a high degree of probability, leads to the survival of someone who might otherwise not have survived.
If the action is a donation, and the answer is Yes, and I have the means. Then I want to do it.
But let’s clarify what this means in practice.
- It must be a monetary donation. Although volunteering is important, I am not in a place where I can do that now.
- The money needs to go more or less directly to the cause, preferably quite soon.
- There has to be some feedback from the cause.
- EU based which accepts IBAN or other ways of receiving donations without paying the credit card companies x%.
3. Feedback loop
This is the main new part for my charitable donations. Previously and currently, my charitable donations go to organisations who I believe do good. But there is little or no feedback loop, so I don’t know what good my money does.
I am doing this exercise, to figure out if there is a more direct way.
When I started, my original idea was to find something where I donate directly to a cause. Like a heart operation for Person X, which would otherwise not happen.
Based on my research, I could not find that. The closest I found was watsi which has names and pictures of the people you help. My impression is that it’s a low-income version of gofundme.
After reviewing the people in need there, it does not meet my criteria for life saving. And when thinking about it, thats a great thing. After all, it would be horrible if there was a website with a list of people who would die unless they raised enough money.
So I expanded my search, instead of trying to find a place with named persons, which adds a lot of overhead I started looking if there would be a way to donate to a clinic, or some other semi direct intervention.
List of potential charities
(Note, I have done only brief research on these and there is likely factual errors. It’s just my personal opinion and not facts)
Chain of Hope (and La Chaîne de l’Espoir)
website website
Focusing on cardiac surgery, especially for kids. Definitely life saving but they seem quite big and from a brief check I don’t see any feedback loop.
KidsOR
website
Builds/improves Operating Rooms abroad. Ships out equipment from UK and installs it, trains the technicians and then helps maintain it. Important and valuable but seems there will be quite a long time between my donation and when it would help someone.
Medeor
website
German organisation focusing on providing medicine and equipment, not personnel or health interventions. Seems promising on the feedback part as it says that donations of 1000 euro and above are counted as “major donations” which receives additional feedback. As they are German, IBAN is possible.
Next steps
I still have a bunch of charities to review. Finding the “perfect” charity is not easy, and it would be easier just to pick one and give. But my hopes is that I will find one I really like, which will have a tight enough feedback loop that I feel I made a difference. This in turn, will cause me to want to give more. After all, if I can help, why wouldn’t I?
Currently, the answer is, because even if I donated everything I owned to the Red Cross, it would help someone, but it wouldn’t be effective use of my money.
Large charities are important, they can do work that nobody else can, but small ones are also important. The big ones can’t be everywhere, and there are people in need in a lot of places.
Same thing about long term vs short term donations. Both are important.
Next step here will hopefully be a decision, and motivation and explanation of why. And then later, hopefully a follow up on what kind of difference it made.