Building the social innovation for health ecosystem in Latin America: experiences and learning from SIHI-LAC

Social innovation for health has grown in relevance and momentum across Latin America.1–5 Yet, the potential of social innovation for health appears mostly untapped, with one reason for this being the limited investment to build strong ecosystems that can support social innovation initiatives.6–8 The Social Innovation in Health Initiative for Latin America and the Caribbean (SIHI-LAC) is an ecosystem approach to advance social innovation within health systems across this region. The paper presents the SIHI-LAC experience, the influence it has had on social innovation initiatives for health, and the lessons learnt over the past 6 years. In addition, this paper provides guidance to other countries and regions interested in strengthening their social innovation for health ecosystems