Wellcome Trust

Wellcome is a global charitable foundation based in London, United Kingdom, established with the vision of achieving a healthier future for everyone. The organisation supports science to address urgent health challenges impacting people worldwide. Its mission is to improve health by fostering the success of great ideas, spanning a broad range of disciplines to understand life, health, and wellbeing. Wellcome aims to deliver equitable health solutions globally, working towards transformative shifts in understanding and providing solutions that benefit those who need them most.

The foundation was established in 1936 following the death of Sir Henry Wellcome, a pharmaceutical entrepreneur known for his pioneering approach to drug design. In his will, Sir Henry Wellcome bequeathed his wealth, his extensive collection of historical medical items, and his mission to improve health through research to the Trust. This legacy enabled the creation of an independent charitable foundation. For its initial five decades, the Wellcome Trust operated as a relatively small charity, utilising profits from the Wellcome Foundation company to fund research grants, laboratory facilities, prizes, and exhibitions related to health and science. The Trust's financial growth significantly expanded after 1986, when it began divesting its pharmaceutical interests, eventually becoming one of the world's largest grant-giving charities.

Wellcome operates as a politically and financially independent global charitable foundation, funded by a substantial investment portfolio. The returns generated from these investments are dedicated to funding the organisation's work. The Trust supports a wide array of research, spanning from fundamental biology to population health studies, encompassing physical sciences, social sciences, clinical research, arts, and humanities. Wellcome provides flexible, long-term funding for researchers across various career stages, including early-career, mid-career, and established professionals. This approach aims to generate new knowledge that can transform health in unforeseen ways and to overcome practical, technological, and methodological barriers in research.

The organisation's current strategy focuses on supporting science to solve urgent health challenges, with dedicated programmes addressing specific global health priorities. These include mental health, climate and health, and infectious diseases. Within mental health, the focus is on understanding anxiety, depression, and psychosis to develop new interventions. For infectious diseases, the Trust supports innovative solutions in the most affected communities. The climate and health programme generates evidence and advocates for policy actions that protect health from climate change. Wellcome also maintains a strong commitment to discovery research, which aims to generate new knowledge across all disciplines related to life, health, and wellbeing. The firm works with communities, governments, and partners globally to advocate for evidence-based health policies.

Beyond direct funding, Wellcome engages in broader initiatives to enhance the research ecosystem and public understanding of health. The organisation supports efforts to improve research culture, aiming to foster environments that prioritise wellbeing and the quality of research. Wellcome also champions open access to academic knowledge, encouraging the publication of research in freely available repositories. The Wellcome Collection, a free museum and library in London and online, serves to challenge perceptions about health and explore the connections between science, medicine, life, and art. Through these diverse activities, Wellcome strives to ensure that everyone benefits from the potential of science to improve health and save lives.