Everything you need to know about the 1% Treaty and the war on disease
The 1% Treaty is a global agreement where nations redirect just 1% of their military spending to fund pragmatic clinical trials integrated into standard healthcare. This gives everyone 1% more security (fewer nuclear weapons pointed at them) while accelerating access to life-saving treatments by years.
1% is strategically chosen because it's small enough to be feasible (doesn't compromise national defense) but large enough to be transformative ($27.2B annually). It's also psychologically powerful: everyone gets 1% more security while gaining years of life through faster medical progress.
Virtually nothing. Modern militaries have massive redundancy and waste. A 1% reduction is easily absorbed through efficiency improvements, reduced procurement waste, or delayed upgrades. No country loses meaningful defensive capability, but everyone gains health security.
The treaty is designed for universal participation, but the top 15 military spenders (US, China, Russia, India, Saudi Arabia, UK, Germany, France, Japan, South Korea, Italy, Australia, Canada, Israel, Spain) account for 81% of global military spending. Their participation alone would fund the entire system.
Pragmatic trials test treatments in real-world healthcare settings using existing medical records and routine care, rather than creating expensive artificial research environments. Patients receive normal care while data is automatically collected, making trials 82x cheaper than traditional methods.
Traditional trials cost $20B+ in recruitment, $15B in manual data collection, $10B in dedicated research sites, and $5B in regulatory overhead. Pragmatic trials eliminate these costs by using existing healthcare infrastructure, electronic health records, and streamlined protocols. Total savings: $50B annually.
Yes. They follow the same scientific principles and regulatory standards. The difference is efficiency, not rigor. Oxford's RECOVERY trial (pragmatic design) enrolled 40,000 patients in months and found effective COVID treatments while traditional trials were still recruiting. Same safety, 82x faster and cheaper.
Everything: new drugs, repurposed existing medications, medical devices, surgical techniques, behavioral interventions, prevention strategies. Pragmatic trials excel at comparing real-world effectiveness of treatments, finding optimal doses, and identifying which patients benefit most.
Immediate impact. Pragmatic trials can begin enrolling patients within weeks of approval. Results for acute conditions (like COVID treatments) can come in months. Chronic disease trials take longer but still deliver answers years faster than traditional methods.
The peace dividend is the $113.6B in annual benefits from reducing global conflict by just 1%. This includes $76.6B in direct costs saved (military spending, infrastructure not destroyed, lives saved, trade not disrupted) plus $37B in indirect costs avoided (lost economic growth, veteran healthcare, refugee support, environmental cleanup, PTSD treatment, lost human capital).
It doesn't automatically. But the treaty creates incentives for cooperation: nations that participate gain health benefits while reducing threat perception. The 1% reduction is symbolic of commitment to peaceful cooperation. The real peace dividend comes from the diplomatic framework and shared investment in human welfare rather than nuclear weapons.
No, it's conservative. Global conflict costs $14.4 trillion annually (Institute for Economics and Peace). A 1% reduction saves $144B, but we only count $113.6B to be cautious. The breakdown is fully documented with sources on our research page.
Yes. The 3.5% rule (from Harvard research) shows that when 3.5% of a population actively supports a cause, it reaches a tipping point for systemic change. We're building that coalition. Plus, the 1% Treaty offers something rare in politics: a win-win where everyone gains security and health.
DIH operates as a decentralized network, not a centralized bureaucracy. Participating nations contribute 1% of military spending to a transparent fund. Research priorities are set democratically with input from patients, doctors, and scientists. Trials are conducted by existing healthcare systems. No new massive institution required.
Pharma companies benefit too. Pragmatic trials reduce their R&D costs by 82x, accelerating time-to-market and expanding the range of profitable treatments. Repurposed drugs and rare disease treatments become economically viable. The current system is broken for everyone; this fixes it.
Blockchain-based fund tracking, open-source protocols, public trial registries, and real-time results publication. All spending is transparent. All data is public. All decisions are documented. The decentralized structure prevents any single entity from controlling the system.
Answer the question on our homepage, share your referral link, join our divisions registry if you represent an organization, donate to support our research, and spread the word. Every voice counts toward the 3.5% tipping point.
Join our divisions registry, connect with allied organizations, advocate for pragmatic trial adoption in your institution, and help design protocols. We need clinical expertise to make this vision real.
Learn about pragmatic trials and their potential to transform healthcare efficiency. Review our research on cost-effectiveness and real-world implementation. Consider how evidence-based policy could improve healthcare outcomes in your jurisdiction.
You still benefit. The treaty creates global public goods: faster medical progress, reduced conflict, and shared knowledge. Even non-participating countries gain access to trial results and treatment advances. But participating countries get priority access and influence over research priorities.
Contact us or dive deeper into the research and evidence