Opportunity profile: The global challenge of maternal health

The Global Maternal and Neonatal Health initiative will run for three years and cover a lot of ground. Philip Woodgate, the MRC’s programme manager for global health challenges, tells Ashleigh Furlong about the initiative’s opening £10-million call.

Philip’s top tips

• Applicants must show how they will leave a legacy in the country where they are working, so reviewers will be looking for evidence of capacity building work.
• Beware of tokenism, either in the form of including a researcher from another discipline just to make the grant more interdisciplinary or including a partner-country investigator who will not contribute real work.
• The equitability of the partnership is vital, and this needs to be demonstrated in the application.
• Early-career researchers are encouraged to apply, but they may want to include detail on how they can access guidance from a more senior investigator.

The Global Maternal and Neonatal Health funding call is a joint initiative between the Medical Research Council, through the Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF), and the National Institute for Health Research.