Thomas J. Long School of Pharmacy and Health Sciences

Guest Speaker Dr. Victoria Hale lectures on “How to Help Humanity Through Social Entrepreneurship”

More than 300 faculty members, staff, and students were present to hear social entrepreneur Dr. Victoria Hale speak at the Thomas J. Long School of Pharmacy and Health Sciences on September 10, 2009. Dr. Hale's visit was the result of a collaborative effort between the Thomas J. Long School of Pharmacy and Health Sciences and the Global Center for Social Entrepreneurship at the School of International Studies. This event was funded by the Flowers Heritage Foundation.

Her presentation, "How to Help Humanity Through Social Entrepreneurship," covered topics such as "what is social entrepreneurship", the process and challenges, and "how to teach children social entrepreneurship." Dr. Hale discussed social entrepreneurship as "hard to put in a box and it doesn't belong in a box." The individual must "think boldly, out of the box and imagine," she added. She quoted Ghandi in her description of her experience: "First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight with you, then you win" described it well.

Dr. Hale's work over the last decade has been to bring inexpensive medicines to underdeveloped countries, fighting devastating diseases that kill millions of people in impoverished areas who cannot afford to purchase the medicines that we "take for granted in the United States." Her non-profit pharmaceutical company Institute of OneWorld Health, founded in 2000, has attracted funds from many philanthropists including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. She is currently working on a second business that will focus on the diseases afflicting women and children.

Throughout the discussion, Dr. Hale reminded the audience that "medicine is for the people" and we are obligated to do what is best for society. She encouraged the audience to engage in poverty alleviation because illnesses such as visceral leishmaniasis, malaria, and diarrhea are not only the cause for the loss of millions of lives, but are also symptoms of poverty.

During hard economic times like these, Dr. Hale focuses on the art of innovation and how we must realize the value of time. She stressed that we should not ponder when to begin, but to begin now. In closing, Dr. Hale quoted Christie Todd Whitman stating "anyone who thinks that they are too small to make a difference has never tried to fall asleep with a mosquito in the room," to illustrate the impact that one individual can make on the world.

Dr. Victoria Hale's work as Founder and Chair Emeritus of the Institute of OneWorld Health was instrumental in developing a new medicine: paromomycin for visceral leishmaniasis and a disruptive technology to reduce the cost of anti-malarials by 10-fold globally. Presently, Dr. Hale is Founder and President of Medicines360, a second generation nonprofit pharmaceutical company.

She has received many awards including her election to membership in the Institute of Medicine of the US National Academies of Science, the MacArthur "Genius" Award, the President's Award of Distinction from the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists, the Economist's Social and Economic Innovation Award, and named Glamour magazine Woman of the Year.

Dr. Hale earned her PhD in Pharmaceutical Chemistry from University of California San Francisco and her bachelors degree in Pharmacy at the University of Maryland. She resides in San Francisco with her husband and two sons.