State Awards Global Health Grants

Washington state has awarded its two grants to support global health technologies. SIGN, a nonprofit in Richland, WA, and Israel-based CircMedTech each received grants worth $150,000 from the state’s new Global Health Technologies Competitiveness Fund. SIGN, which was profiled by Xconomy in September 2008, has developed technology to help doctors in developing countries properly fix broken bones people suffer in car accidents. CircMedTech is the developer of a device to circumcise newborn babies in a way to reduce the spread of HIV and other infections. The state plans to ask for another round of grant proposals before the end of March, according to a statement from the Washington Global Health Alliance.

Author: Luke Timmerman

Luke is an award-winning journalist specializing in life sciences. He has served as national biotechnology editor for Xconomy and national biotechnology reporter for Bloomberg News. Luke got started covering life sciences at The Seattle Times, where he was the lead reporter on an investigation of doctors who leaked confidential information about clinical trials to investors. The story won the Scripps Howard National Journalism Award and several other national prizes. Luke holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and during the 2005-2006 academic year, he was a Knight Science Journalism Fellow at MIT.