Launching the Invest4Health project – Mobilising Novel Finance Models for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention
The Invest4Health Horizon Europe (I4H) project was officially launched in January 2023. But the kick-off meeting happened on 1-2 February. During this successful and very productive meeting in Malmö the consortium partners discussed the project’s goals, objectives, the key concepts, timeline, and responsibilities of each team member.
The Invest4Health Horizon Europe (I4H) project was officially launched in January 2023. But the kick-off meeting happened on 1-2 February. During this successful and very productive meeting in Malmö the consortium partners discussed the project’s goals, objectives, key concepts, timeline, and responsibilities of each team member.
The Invest4Health project
The capacity of governments to allocate additional funding for health and social care has been diminishing for some time: however, budgets are pitched to citizens. Our response is that it is better to pre-empt rather than repair i.e., to prioritize preventative measures rather than reactive ones, and to incentivize new methods of financing health promotion and disease prevention. The financing solution we offer is Smart Capacitating Investment (SCI) which aims to provide sustainable funding for preventative health measures.
Main actions
The main actions of this project include introducing and explaining Smart Capacitating Investment using available evidence, ensuring that organizations in regions are ready to try it out, testing business models that are compatible with SCI to identify the most effective financing methods, and finally building a collaborative platform to govern SCI in health promotion and prevention.
Using an interdisciplinary approach, ideas will be implemented and evaluated in 4 regional testbeds in different countries. Feedback from citizens and local communities will also be gathered to inform further development of the models and tools. In addition, an open call will be launched to attract a second group of regions to test and provide feedback on the effectiveness of the proposed models and tools.
The innovation
Building on the concept of social investment we aim to develop sustainable financing mechanisms that incentivize and boost investment within and between sectors, while disrupting the traditional approach. This project will help us learn how to do SCI more effectively.
So, for I4H, SCI means collaborating to invest at a large scale across different levels of health ecosystems, while managing risks and generating sustainable returns and localized benefits. SCI will create a positive impact by not only tested and validated new financing and business models, but also expertise, networks, and other types of support to help organizations in prevention and health promotion to reach their full potential. The support includes mentorship, training and education, access to networks and partnerships, and technical assistance.
Key actors
The partners will work with healthcare decision-makers and policymakers, health insurers and other funders, public authorities & civil society, citizens and patients, as well as industry. The goal is to achieve a paradigm shift by developing and testing models, alternative governance mechanisms and tools/methods together with stakeholder groups that will facilitate the use of SCI in health promotion and prevention.
What the project aims to achieve in the long run is getting the resources in place to deliver the right intervention/service to the right population/group/individual at the right time.
The project manager, Jolanda van Vliet from Region Skåne, Sweden highlighted:
‘I am honoured to lead this exciting and large-scale project on behalf of my region, which presents a significant and stimulating challenge for all partners involved. With the diverse expertise of the consortium partners, our objective is to develop an innovative investment model that effectively demonstrates practical applications in support of health promotion and prevention. The kick-off meeting was crucial for our successful collaboration, as we laid the foundations, clarified key concepts, and are ready to overcome any obstacles to achieve our goals over the next 3.5 years. We believe that by strengthening health promotion and prevention through innovative investment, we will together make significant progress towards improving the health outcomes of our populations, transforming our healthcare systems, and tackling the health challenges all societies are facing in both the short and long run.’
The Consortium
The consortium is made up of 18 partners from 8 countries working to improve health promotion and prevention. The partnership has testbeds in various types of health systems and covers 351 municipalities.
Contact details
Jolanda van Vliet, project manager, Region Skane, Sweden: jolanda.vanvliet@skane.se
Sebestyén Edit, Stichting Health ClusterNet, edit@healthclusternet.eu
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon Europe Research and Innovation programme, under Grant Agreement 101095522