Author:
Siemens Andie,Rustja Samantha,Doiron R. Christopher,Siemens D. Robert
Abstract
AbstractThe online solicitation of public donations has become an important financing option for health care expenses, intensified by increasing costs and deficits of universal public systems (1). With growing internet access and success of the largest social crowdfunding platform, GoFundMe, online appeals for medical causes have grown significantly over the last decade in low-to high-income countries. The purpose of this study was to qualitatively describe the use of GoFundMe as a crowdfunding platform for global health initiatives given its supremacy in the social crowdfunding market. Three different cohorts (n=100 each) of online solicitation were examined as a cross-section comparing global health appeals to those for personal health care and animal activism. Variables included the purpose for crowdfunding, the characteristics of beneficiaries and campaigns, and the factors associated with funding success. Our cross-sectional review found that global health campaigns were focused on voluntourism opportunities compared to more specific, individualized appeals for those in need. Global health campaigns appeared to be the least ambitious and generally the least successful of those reviewed. Grouping the most and least successful campaigns between the different cohorts, global health appears to be more successful when targeting a larger population to donate smaller amounts of money and relying on sharing via social media. We suggest that compared to online solicitation for personal health and animal activism objectives, crowdfunding on GoFundMe has unrealized potential as a tool for global health initiatives. More work should be conducted using different crowdfunding platforms and a more longitudinal review in order to expand on these findings and their implications on health care provision in the countries examined. Furthermore, future inquiry is needed to understand the social and ethical implications of online solicitation for global health endeavors in order to inform policy and promote discussion around equity and accessibility.
Publisher
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
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