Novartis Foundation confirms new members of its Board of trustees, including new Chairman Dr. Joerg Reinhardt - Seite 2

"We are at a crucial point in global health. In low- and middle-income countries we still struggle with managing infectious disease, maternal and child health and malnutrition, while at the same time, there is a growing crisis of non-communicable diseases such as heart disease and diabetes. There is also the emergence of technology and connectivity that allows us to reach patients and healthcare professionals more than ever before," said Professor Peter Piot. "I am excited to be part of the Novartis Foundation team working with the global health community to innovate healthcare delivery addressing this double burden of disease to improve the health of people in these geographies and to empower their communities and governments to sustain improved health services for the long term."

The Novartis Foundation is a philanthropic organization pioneering innovative healthcare models that can have a transformational impact on the health of the poorest populations. We work hand-in-hand with our local and global partners to accelerate elimination of leprosy and malaria by focusing on interventions that aim to interrupt transmission, and to catalyze scalable and sustainable healthcare models to improve access and health outcomes. Everything we do is grounded in evidence and innovation, and our work is a continuous cycle of evaluation, adaptation and application. In 2014, the operational budget for the foundation was CHF 12 million and our programs reached 3.6 million people.

Disclaimer
This press release contains expressed or implied forward-looking statements, including statements that can be identified by terminology such as "will," "committed," "to improve," "to empower," "can," "to accelerate," "to improve," or similar expressions. Such forward-looking statements reflect the current views of the Group regarding future events, and involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results to be materially different from any future results expressed or implied by such statements. These expectations could be affected by, among other things, risks and factors referred to in the Risk Factors section of Novartis AG's current Form 20-F on file with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Novartis is providing the information in this press release as of this date and does not undertake any obligation to update it in the future.