Can It work? Multi level marketing (MLM) in health education

Multilevel marketing (MLM ) is a type of direct sales where independent people who are not employees of a company sell company products  and get commission on the products they sell and on the products that people they recruit sell.  It is also called network marketing. Although, MLM has been used to market healthcare products, it has not been used in health education. The paper describes an idea of a non profit organization (Shout – global health) to use MLM in public health education. The idea views health education as a product to be marketed and  involves first recruiting ten people who will be taught and trained about a particular public health issue (for example safe sex). Once they finish their training, each person will recruit 10 more people that will also be trained. Everyone will be paid between $50 and $100 upon recruitment of 10 people. This sequence keeps going on till there is a wide awareness about the health issue in a geographical area. If the MLM idea worked, it will foster health education, improve public health, and at the same time reduce poverty level in low income countries which in turn promote socio economic status and health status of the population. The paper concludes by analyzing the pros and cons of inculcating MLM in Public Health Education