Early death is an inconsolable fact of life. In the world’s poorest nations, like Angola from where I’m writing now, a quarter of children die before reaching school age, and adults can hardly expect to live much beyond age forty. Such disturbing truths motivate many healthcare professionals to do something bold on behalf of the world’s most disadvantaged people. Yet so many of our efforts fail to address the most fundamental issue: poverty itself. If healthcare is so difficult to sustain for those who are most poor, why not direct our effort toward alleviating poverty? In his provocative book The End Of Poverty, Columbia University professor Jeffrey D. Sachs brilliantly illustrates how economic growth in the poorest nations – those where people live on less than one dollar per day – has brought with it unprecedented progress in physical health. How does economic growth foster physical health? Through improvements in housing, nutrition, vector control, water and sanitation, general education, industrial safety, medical care, and incentives to reduce fertility.