The nonprofit organization Last Mile Health (LMH) was named the 2026 recipient of the Conrad N. Hilton Humanitarian Prize on Wednesday. The award includes a $3 million gift, which is the world's largest humanitarian prize given to a nonprofit group.
Dr. Raj Panjabi co-founded Last Mile Health in 2007 with $6,000 in donations from his wedding guests to provide medical care to remote regions of Liberia. The organization utilizes a model of community health workers—local residents with primary school educations who undergo eight weeks of medical training—to diagnose and treat preventable diseases and monitor for outbreaks.
Since its founding, the organization has expanded from 17 original workers to a network of 20,000 health workers across Liberia, Ethiopia, Malawi, and Sierra Leone. The group collaborated with the Liberian government to manage the 2014-2016 Ebola epidemic and reached an 81% COVID-19 vaccination rate in Liberia by delivering 6.2 million pieces of protective equipment and conducting door-to-door outreach.
The funding arrives amid projections cited by Panjabi from a Lancet study, which stated that U.S. foreign aid cuts in 2025 could lead to 14 million additional deaths globally by 2030, including 4.5 million children under five. For families in these remote regions, the presence of a professionalized health worker means the difference between treating a fever at home with rapid diagnostic tests or facing potentially fatal delays in reaching distant clinics.
Last Mile Health plans to use the $3 million prize money immediately to expand its reach to 50 million people by 2028. The organization also intends to continue its work with Africa Frontline First, a continent-wide initiative to implement community health worker programs in additional countries. This expansion aims to professionalize front-line practitioners rather than relying on volunteers to provide curative services.