The Global Alliance for Genomics and Health (GA4GH) is an international coalition of over 140 member organizations dedicated to improving human health by maximizing the potential of genomic medicine. The group’s diverse membership includes world -leading institutions in healthcare, research, patient and disease advocacy, life science, and information technology who are working together on open interfaces and catalytic projects to enable effective and responsible data sharing and guide this quickly evolving field.

On September 18, 2014 the Global Alliance adopted a Constitution to formally guide and govern the structure and membership criteria of the organization. In less than a month, the CNAG and more than 135 organizations of the over 200 that had originally signed a Letter of Intent have already transitioned to full members of GA4GH. It is expected that many more organizations and individuals will do so in the coming months.

GA4GH 2nd plenary meeting at ASHG
The Global Alliance convened its second major meeting of 2014, bringing together more than 250 international leaders to collaborate on the development of innovative solutions to accelerate sharing of genomic and clinical data. At their plenary meeting, held on October 18th at the ASHG 2014 in San Diego, California, Alliance members shared progress to date and discussed next steps for the effort.

“The Global Alliance is focused on developing approaches that will enable sharing of genomic and clinical data. In just over one year, we have established a vibrant international effort to accelerate progress in harmonizing regulations and ethics, methods for sharing genomic and clinical data, and approaches to privacy and security,” said David Altshuler, Chair of the Global Alliance Steering Committee and Deputy Director of the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT. “Our members are dedicated to producing work products and to undertaking data sharing projects that break down barriers and increase learning from data.”