Bending the Arc

Thirty years ago, a group of improbable heroes came together on a mission that was both medical and moral, and, by everyone's estimation other than their own, highly unlikely to succeed. Their goal was simple but daring: to make high-quality healthcare available to everyone, even in the world's poorest countries. Fighting entrenched diseases, political and bureaucratic machinery, and the charity-industrial complex itself, these crusaders forced the international community to embrace the idea that health care must be a basic human right in every society and went ahead to provide it. In doing so, they have changed the lives of millions of people across the globe.