Building on a vision outlined in a 2 am speech, U.S. President John F. Kennedy created the Peace Corps by Executive Order in 1961.
Between 2009 and 2010, the Institute of Medicine released two reports, of which one focused on the importance of health to international development and diplomacy, and the other on the critical need for health-based human resources to strengthen the HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria efforts.
Furthermore, in September 2010, physicians Paul Farmer, Sara Auld, and Vanessa Kerry’s Perspectives piece in the New England Journal of Medicine reinvigorated the argument for a program comparable to GHSP.
Vanessa Kerry and Sara Auld started a grassroots campaign online, created a petition, and began to connect to many of its original champions.
In an op-ed in The Huffington Post, Anand Reddi proposed integrating the GHSC within the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief.
Vanessa Kerry and Sara Auld attended the event and asked the directors: "What did the Peace Corp directors think about sending doctors, nurses, and other health professionals abroad as Peace Corps Volunteer medical educators to invest in human resources for health?"
Applications for Global Health Service Partnership Peace Corps Volunteers (GHSP PCVs) opened in July 2012 and closed on December 1, 2012.