The Oak Foundation has awarded MiracleFeet a $5 million grant over five years to treat clubfoot in low-income countries. The grant will support a 15-year plan in cooperation with the Global Clubfoot Initiative to end the disability caused by untreated clubfoot worldwide. The foundation has awarded MiracleFeet with grant funding every year since 2011. This new and largest grant, which provides general operating funds to make treatment more readily accessible, takes aim at a root cause of poverty in developing countries. MiracleFeet is responsible for raising $2 million in new funding over the next three years to qualify for the $2 million in years four and five.
“We are so honored to have the Oak Foundation’s continued support. Oak Foundation has believed in MiracleFeet since our inception, and this generous gift will help ensure that an additional 60,000 children born with clubfoot get the treatment they need to lead active, healthy, and productive lives,” said Chesca Colloredo-Mansfeld, MiracleFeet executive director.
About 90 percent of the 180,000 children born with clubfoot each year live in low- and middle-income countries. Although clubfoot can be fully treated for about $250 in most cases, families in low-income countries have limited access to treatment. MiracleFeet estimates that if every child born with clubfoot were treated it would result in $25 billion of increased earnings, and that treating 60,000 children under the five-year period of the grant will result in $8 billion of increased earnings.
