Thanks to the Noora Health team for publishing this article with us!

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Noora Health, a public health nonprofit organization, is auctioning an NFT to support their work with underserved communities in South Asia.

Noora Health trains patients’ families to take care of them after they leave the hospital. By empowering caregivers with the knowledge and skills they need to care for their loved ones, Noora’s program reduces preventable complications, readmissions, and even death.

Noora Health is selling its first NFT titled ‘Save Thousands of Lives’, with the goal of raising funds to support their work. It is called this because they will use the proceeds from the sale of the NFT to save lives. They estimate that with each $1,235 raised by selling it, they can save one life (and improve several more). That means that the higher the price of this NFT goes, the more lives they will be able to save.

Their program runs in 165 hospitals in South Asia, serving primarily new mothers and their families, and has reached more than 1 million patients and families to date. During and beyond the COVID-19 crisis, women in India continue having babies, but with enormous challenges. Data they’ve collected since 2018 indicates that they can save 9 babies per 1000 live births, at this cost.

This NFT is different in that it is not tied to a digital file or work of art. What the final bidder will own, in this case, is the knowledge that the money they spent to buy it saved lives, and proof that they were the one who paid for this project. Noora Health imagines this NFT as something that can be handed down through generations or gifted to a loved one. The auction announcement generated some buzz online, with Paul Graham writing an essay about it and placing the initial bid.  

Noora Health stresses that they could never put a price on a life, nor is this an attempt to; but that by being precise about the costs of their work, they’re highlighting the potential impact one can have by donating to efforts of this type. Besides fundraising for its own work, Noora Health hopes to start a conversation about new approaches to fundraising through its NFT auction – something that other organizations can tap into to reach potential supporters who otherwise might not have heard about them.