London – Unilever and the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL) announce Dr Sara Saeed as the winner of the third HRH The Prince of Wales Young Sustainability Entrepreneur Prize.
Dr Sara Saeed, 29, co-founder of doctHERs – a digital platform which connects impoverished communities in Pakistan to high-quality healthcare while reintegrating qualified female doctors into the workforce – was awarded the prize at a prestigious awards ceremony in London, UK last night.
While 90% of Pakistan’s 120 million citizens have little or no access to quality healthcare, socio-cultural barriers prevent around 87% of qualified women doctors from working. Since May 2015, doctHERs has directly impacted 15,000 lives through clinical services, 100,000 lives indirectly through community outreach and, now employs fifteen doctors, five nurses and five specialists. By 2020, doctHERs aims to scale its nurse-assisted video consultation program to over 500 clinics across Pakistan, directly impacting 1.2 million people.
Dr Sara Saeed said: “When a patient gets treated in my clinic, and when a doctor gets a job and when a nurse is empowered in a community – my passion increases every day. I’m honoured to have received this award and delighted that the work of doctHERs in Pakistan has been recognised, especially in light of the innovative and inspiring projects of the other finalists. With financial and mentoring support, I am now looking forward to working with community partners and organisations such as Unilever to impact even more lives.”
The Awards are part of Unilever’s efforts to support the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and celebrate inspirational entrepreneurs aged 35 and under who have developed a product, service or application that tackles some of the world’s biggest sustainability challenges.
Unilever and CISL believe that the younger generation may have the most important contributions to make – their ingenuity and determination can help identify sustainable solutions to what are often seen as impossible problems.