When I first read this article, I thought I'd missed something. Watsi isn't funding the coverage--they primarily provided a way to efficiently administer it. Th

When I first read this article, I thought I'd missed something. Watsi isn't funding the coverage--they primarily provided a way to efficiently administer it. That seems a lot more sustainable than what I initially assumed. Cost savings and scalability seem to come from: * Easy to ensure treatment guidelines are being followed (so it's catch and eliminate non-administrative waste). * Avoiding more expensive interventions by providing cheaper, early intervention. * Easy to track who's enrolled (which also kills the free-rider problem). * Overall less time (=money) spent on administration in general. I'm curious if these can be teased apart. What percentage of savings is from early intervention vs. unnecessary treatments? I'm also curious why 98% of people signed up. Was it good outreach/marketing, increased trust that the system would be beneficial to them (as opposed to bureaucratic delays), or free-riders no longer getting a free ride? Did it get cheaper? More reliable? Why didn't the other 2% sign up? I'm sure these variables will all be fairly different when they go on to the next community, but they'd be interesting to look at. I'm also eager to see what this does for the medical infrastructure (and economic growth) down the line. This should make it easier for places offering medical care to get their funding efficiently and quickly, so I would expect them to scale as need grows better than they would otherwise. I hope this means also much more stable school attendance and economic stability for families and communities. Is this more cost-effective and sustainable than just buying people bed nets? Track this and find out. A lot of funding will flow to whatever can be demonstrated to be maximally effective, and it's important for us to find those interventions.