Minister Paradis to Announce Partnership With Grand Challenges Canada

TORONTO, ON--(Marketwired - June 12, 2015) - The Honourable Christian Paradis, Minister of International Development and La Francophonie, will join 10 Canadian-based innovators at Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids), on Friday June 12 for an important announcement regarding a new partnership with Grand Challenges Canada.

Grand Challenges Canada is now five years old and has supported to date 700 innovations in 80 countries to improve global health.

Ten exemplary innovations will be featured at the announcement, all improving health in low-resource areas:

• Wind-up powered fetal heart monitor (SickKids, Toronto, tests in Uganda)
• A smart-phone EEG app that diagnoses seizure disorders (University of Ottawa, tests in Bhutan)
• Listen with your eyes - Helping deaf children 'hear' through a personal eyepiece (Sense Intelligent, Toronto, tests in China, India)
• A newly designed "Flocked Swab" that improves diagnosis and treatment of deadly childhood diarrheal diseases in Africa (McMaster University, Hamilton, tests in Botswana, Nunavut)
• Lucky Iron Fish, added to cooking pots to tackle anemia (Guelph, tests in Cambodia)
• The All-Terrain AT-Knee, a sturdy, versatile, affordable prosthetic for leg amputees (Toronto, tests in Africa)
• Helping people with hearing loss in developing world (Hearing Access World, Montreal, tests in Guatemala)
• A safe, affordable and re-usable women's personal hygiene kit (University of Toronto, tests in Kenya)
• A maternal device for preventing stillbirth, low birthweight babies (Innovative Canadians for Change Foundation, AB and Halifax, tests in Ghana)
• Clean Birth Kit for newborns (SickKids, Toronto, tests in Pakistan)

Full details:

Friday, June 12
The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto

10.00 a.m.
Photo opportunity for media in medical examination room:
Please meet at entrance, 555 University Avenue, at 9:55 am
Demonstration of Wind-Up Fetal Heart Rate Monitor with an expectant mother

10.15 a.m.
Walk to main announcement room: Gallery of the Peter Gilgan Centre for Learning and Research (PGCRL), 686 Bay Street.

Media not attending the 10:00 a.m. photo opportunity should proceed directly to the PGCRL Gallery for 10:30 a.m.

10.30 a.m.
Announcement:
* Stanley Zlotkin, Chief, Centre for Global Child Health, The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids)
* The Honourable Christian Paradis, Minister of International Development and La Francophonie
* Peter A. Singer, CEO, Grand Challenges Canada

10.40 a.m.
Photo opportunity with 10 innovators