Moving Beyond Insulin
We started with a vision. How do we give Canadians freedom from diabetes? How do we make the biggest impact? This vision anchored our thinking to build a campaign that focused on maximizing impact, speed and leveraging partners to accomplish this. Now is the time to accelerate.
Our six fundraising priorities:
Our fundraising priorities provide a framework for attacking the disease at every angle, helping to improve quality of life for those living with T1D today and with the ultimate goal of giving them freedom from diabetes.
1. The JDRF-CIHR Partnership to Defeat Diabetes
Campaign Goal: $25M (prospective match by CIHR for a total of $50M)
This partnership supports high-profile research and clinical trials matched dollar for dollar by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), to support our key research goals: finding a cure and improving lives.
CIHR is Canada’s federal health research funding agency, whose mandate is to create new knowledge and facilitate its translation into improved health for Canadians. The JDRF-CIHR Partnership to Defeat Diabetes forged in 2017 is a landmark collaboration to ensure that T1D remains a priority in Canadian health research and is based on a shared vision of improved care, treatment, outcomes and cures for those living with T1D.
2. High-Impact Global Research
Campaign Goal: $26M
Our global research strategy harnesses the work of world-leading investigators and trainees in Canada and beyond to make breakthroughs in the areas of screening, prevention, better treatment, and cures.
Donor support allows JDRF to fund cutting-edge research and clinical trials in Canada and around the world that bridge the gap between science and clinical care. Under this pillar, JDRF also grants yearly funding to budding scientists who show great promise with their diabetes research, through career development awards and postdoctoral fellowships. Many of these trainees go on to become world-renowned experts in T1D research.
3. JDRF Centre of Excellence at UBC
Campaign Goal: $10M
The JDRF Centre of Excellence at UBC in Vancouver will constitute a hub where a multidisciplinary team will accelerate a research program laser-focused on developing T1D cures.
Vancouver is home to world-class experts with a long history of JDRF support who are working on T1D research across top-tier institutions: The University of British Columbia (UBC), and BC Children’s Hospital Research Institute (BCCHRI) and Vancouver General Hospital (VGH). By leveraging existing facilities, donations will directly support research focused on three interdependent themes: providing a new source of insulin-producing beta cells, protecting beta cells from immune attack, and targeting and monitoring beta cell stress.
4. The T1D Fund
Campaign Goal: $10M
JDRF launched the T1D Fund in 2016 to create a new investment market aimed at delivering solutions to those living with or at risk of developing T1D. A combination of venture capital and philanthropy, the T1D fund is focused on equity investments in companies developing life-changing T1D products. Profit realized through these investments are then funneled back into the fund.
In 2015, JDRF recognized that there was a significant gap between scientific advancements and commercial products becoming available to those who need them. JDRF’s T1D Fund, created in 2016, is the largest disease-focused venture philanthropy fund in the world, with USD $100 million in assets to-date. When donors back this fund through a transformational four-year, tax-receiptable pledge of USD $500K or more, their investments support companies with a focus on drugs, devices, diagnostics and other health solutions with application to T1D. The T1D Fund chooses highly profitable companies that show promise to making the greatest clinical impact on T1D – leading to better disease management and potential cures.
5. Access for All
Campaign Goal: $2M
#AccessForAll aims to make diabetes technology affordable and accessible for all Canadians with T1D, by directly advocating to governments, insurers, and other stakeholders, and by supporting the community in their efforts to increase public and private coverage for insulin pumps and advanced glucose monitors.
Working with JDRF, the T1D community advocates at both the provincial and federal levels to ensure equitable and fair access to devices that improve the quality of life for people living with diabetes. Together, we can reduce the out-of-pocket costs for these technologies and improve access for Canadians with T1D.
6. Mental Health
Campaign Goal: $2M
T1D impacts more than physical health ̶ it also affects emotional, social, and behavioural well-being, known collectively as psychosocial health. Psychosocial health needs are vastly underappreciated and undertreated in T1D, and the Canadian healthcare system has very limited capacity to support the need. At JDRF, we’re prepared to lead the dialogue about identifying and addressing the psychosocial impacts of T1D.
JDRF will fund research that focuses on psychosocial aspects of T1D, as well as healthcare professional training programs that help to fill gaps in care. This will strengthen education among health care providers to help them better provide holistic care for the T1D community. JDRF will also expand upon existing community support such as peer support and mentorship programs that help families living with T1D feel better connected and less alone.