Many donors want to fight diseases that have affected them personally—and that irritates Holden Karnofsky, co-founder of GiveWell, a group that analyzes the effectiveness of charities for donors.

People should think instead about working to eradicate diseases that would not threaten the lives of anyone they know—like diarrhea, he writes on The GiveWell Blog.

“Fighting diarrhea is simple and saves lives immediately,” he writes. “Nobody should be dying from it, anywhere, but they are—in large part because people who can help, people like you, aren’t around and haven’t seen them ‘up close,’ and are focused on the specific, narrow kind of suffering you’ve seen, instead of on fighting human suffering as well as we can.”

Mr. Karnofsky says he knows people he respects will disagree with that view. But, he adds, “this blog is personal and unfiltered, as you’ve been warned before.”

Do you agree that donors should try to ease human suffering in general rather than focusing on issues that have affected them directly? Share your thoughts by clicking on the comments link below this post.