Our Mission
One person speaking is easy to ignore. A community speaking together is a ripple, and ripples don't stop.
Why we exist
The Ripple Effect Foundation exists because people get ignored. Whatever they're living through: an illness nobody believes, a situation nobody's fixing, a community nobody's listening to. Alone, each of them is easy to dismiss. We exist so no community has to start from silence, whatever its fight is. When people find each other and speak together, the world has to listen. Long COVID is where we proved that. It won't be the only place we do it.
How a ripple works
One. It starts with one person willing to tell the truth about what they're living through. The ripple. We gather those stories and count what they prove: the symptoms, the costs, the years, in the community's own words and its own numbers. The movement. We put that evidence where it can't be ignored: in front of researchers, decision-makers, and everyone who needs to know they're not alone.
7,000+ community members · 25 stories published in their own words · 49 statements counted
What we're going to accomplish
We're going to help as many people as possible, in as many different communities, situations, and categories as we can reach: our campaigns won't all be about health, and they won't all work the same way. Each one gets built around what its community actually needs, until being unheard is the exception, not the rule. We can't promise any one person a cure or a check. We can promise their story will be counted, their voice will be carried, and they won't carry it alone.
Where it started
This foundation began as conversations between two veterans, Joseph Green and Stephanie Wood, more than a year before it had a name. Our first campaign, Long COVID, proved the model: a community of more than 7,000 people, dozens of stories published in their own words, and data counted straight from patients' own reports.
Change starts with one. Be the one.
Join the Movement
Donate Now