It is all about positive disruption, a vital catalyst for change that will pave the way for true progress for the global community and the challenges we all face in health and development. It is about inspiring ideas that go beyond the light bulb moment, experiencing birth by becoming tangible, concrete and actionable. It is about change.

TEDxChange, an event which stemmed from the partnership of the TEDx program and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, acts as a catalyst for global conversations on ideas worth spreading primarily in the field of health and development. Hosted in Seattle, Washington, this year’s TEDxChange will be broadcasted live across the global TEDx community. You can see it on the screens of TEDxBrusselsChange.

In addition to the global discussion on positive disruption, TEDxBrusselsChange will be featuring three live speakers who will challenge the status quo of healthcare through connection and communication. Our speakers, who are all united by their passion for change and making things happen, will share how medical taboos can be disrupted and how interconnectedness online can help the medical community share knowledge and fuel innovation.

Videos of the event:

Lode Dewulf

Peter Vander Auwera

Sylvie Coumel & Phyllis Zimmer

Photos of the event:

Brussels
Belgium

Lode Dewulf

<p> <img src="http://www.tedxbrussels.eu/2013/images/official%20photo%20lode.jpg" align="left" width="187" height="125";> Lode Dewulf, Chief Patient Affairs Officer at UCB, has more than 20 years of pharmaceutical medical experience around the world. He is a physician who is passionate about patients’ perspectives and more. </p><br><br><br><br><br>

Peter Vander Auwera

<p> <img src="http://www.tedxbrussels.eu/2013/images/petervan%20informal.jpg" align="left" width="187" height="125";> Peter Vander Auwera, Innovation Leader at SWIFT, is also the co-initiator of Corporate Rebels United, a movement to unite corporate rebels across the globe to ensure that true change happens virally. </p><br><br><br><br><br>

Sylvie Coumel & Phyllis Zimmer

<p> <img src="http://www.tedxbrussels.eu/2013/images/sylvie%20phyllis.jpg" align="left" width="187" height="115";> <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/pub/sylvie-coumel/18/88/295">Sylvie Coumel</a> (left) is the Director for Stakeholder and Advocacy at Sanofi while <a href="http://www.son.washington.edu/faculty/faculty_bio.asp?id=122">Phyllis Zimmer</a> (right) is the President of the Nurse Practitioner Healthcare Foundation (USA). They both believe that communication and knowledge sharing are essential to creating awareness about diseases and finding patient-centered solutions. </p><br><br><br><br><br>

TEDxChange Speakers, Seattle

<hr><hr width="300"><p><font color="grey"> <b>HOST of the TEDxChange event in Seattle: </b><b>Melinda Gates</b> <img src="http://www.tedxbrussels.eu/2013/images/feature_melinda-gates.png" align="left" width="187" height="145";> is co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Along with Bill Gates, she shapes and approves the foundation’s strategies, reviews results, and sets the overall direction of the organization. Melinda will host TEDxChange from the Gates Foundation campus in Seattle, Washington. </font></p><br></br><br></br>

Cathleen Kaveny

<p><p><font color="grey"> <img src="http://www.tedxbrussels.eu/2013/images/speaker_cathleen-kaveny.png" align="left" width="187" height="125";> Cathleen Kaveny is an American legal scholar and theologian. She is currently John P. Murphy Foundation Professor of Law and Theology at Notre Dame Law School, where she has been on the faculty since 1995. </font></p><br><br><br><br>

David Fasayana

<p><p><font color="grey"> <img src="http://www.tedxbrussels.eu/2013/images/speaker_david-fasanya.png" align="left" width="187" height="125";> David Fasanya is a Nigerian-American performance artist and award-winning youth poet residing in Brooklyn, NY. </font></p><br><br><br><br><br><br><br>

Julie Dixon

<p><p><font color="grey"> <img src="http://www.tedxbrussels.eu/2013/images/speaker_julie-dixon.png" align="left" width="187" height="125";><p class="margin"> Julie Dixon is the Deputy Director of Georgetown University's Center for Social Impact Communication (CSIC), an academic initiative that examines the critical role of communication in fostering engagement in social change. </font></p><br><br><br><br>

Salim Shekh and Sikha Patra

<p><p><font color="grey"> <img src="http://www.tedxbrussels.eu/2013/images/speaker_ss.png" align="left" width="187" height="125";> Salim is a 15 year old boy who lives in a polluted slum in East Kolkata. Sikha is a 15 year old girl who lives in a slum called Neheru Colony. This dynamic duo is engaged to eradicate polio from their communities by developing community maps to share with a global audience--making their invisible communities visible. </font></p><br><br><br><br>

Halimatou Hima

<p><p><font color="grey"> <img src="http://www.tedxbrussels.eu/2013/images/speaker_halimatou-hima.png" align="left" width="187" height="125";> Halimatou Hima is a Masters in Public Policy candidate at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. Following an internship in the Women & Population Division at the United Nations Foundation, she worked in the Child Protection Division at the United Nations in her home country of Niger (UNICEF). </font></p><br><br><br><br>

Roger Thurow

<p><p><font color="grey"> <img src="http://www.tedxbrussels.eu/2013/images/speaker_roger-thurow.png" align="left" width="187" height="125";> Roger Thurow joined the Chicago Council in January 2010 after three decades at the Wall Street Journal. For 20 years, he was a foreign correspondent based in Europe and Africa. </font></p><br><br><br><br>