Bill and Melinda Gates announce one of the biggest charitable donations in history

[editor]

$10bn!!!

Bill and Melinda Gates have announced one of the biggest charitable donations in history – an unprecedented $10bn (£6.24bn) investment in vaccines for children in poor countries over the next decade.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, the Microsoft founder called for "a decade of vaccines" to reduce child mortality dramatically by 2020. The money will save an estimated 8 million lives, the couple say. It will pay for a big push to step up coverage of existing vaccines, such as for diptheria, tetanus and whooping cough, and new ones for pneumonia and diarrhoeal diseases, which are big killers of small children.

The Gates Foundation has made child immunisation the cornerstone of its work in the developing world. "Vaccines are a miracle – with just a few doses, they can prevent deadly diseases for a lifetime," said Melinda Gates. "We've made vaccines our number one priority at the Gates Foundation because we've seen first hand their incredible impact on children's lives."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/jan/29/gates-10bn-vacccines-children-charity

 

[weltweit]

good

 

[Shippou-Sensei]

reminds me when he managed to shame the american government by giving vastly more than they did to an earthquake relief fund... they ended up quickly revising how much they were going to give

 

[Voley]

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, the Microsoft founder called for "a decade of vaccines"

Conclusive proof that the controllers are trying to kill us all, imo.

 

[tarannau]

I warmed to Gates slightly after he mocked Italy's lack of foreign aid budget recently, choosing to chide Berlusconi at spending more effort on his hair transplants than aid.

 

[Jazzz]

This isn't charity, it's poison.

If Bill Gates really wanted to help, he'd provide clean water - I believe this sum would cover that for the whole of Africa twice over.

 

[editor]

This isn't charity, it's poison.

If Bill Gates really wanted to help, he'd provide clean water - I believe this sum would cover that for the whole of Africa twice over.

There's times I wish we could add more than 5 of these for your posts, Jazzz.

We’re working with partners to expand access to safe water and sanitation for poor people in developing countries; to develop affordable and sustainable methods to deliver services; and to promote effective approaches....

Our goal is to help tens of millions of people in Asia and sub-Saharan Africa benefit from safe water, sanitation, and hygiene.

http://www.gatesfoundation.org/topics/pages/water-sanitation-hygiene.aspx#

 

[Jazzz]

There's times I wish we could add more than 5 of these for your posts, Jazzz.

Well I'd be in favour of more smilies, I'm sure you could sort it.

But tell me, would you care to guess at the proportion of money Bill Gates spends on clean water, compared to drugs and vaccines?

What would you think is reasonable - given that hundreds of millions are without clean water?

 

[innit]

This isn't charity, it's poison.

If Bill Gates really wanted to help, he'd provide clean water - I believe this sum would cover that for the whole of Africa twice over.

sweet jesus

 

[david dissadent]

I even forgive him for ME for that.

 

[spacemonkey]

This isn't charity, it's poison.

It really isn't though is it. It's going to save millions of children from a horrific needless death.

I even forgive him for ME for that.

Lets not get ahead of ourselves.

 

[Yuwipi Woman]

I even forgive him for ME for that.

There's still no excuse for Vista.

 

[Jazzz]

Look, we can have the debate about whether vaccines are beneficial or harmful many times over. But what really cannot be denied at all is that clean water/sanitation is far, far more beneficial to health than any number of these shots. Suppose you have the choice - filthy water for life and any vaccine you wished, or clean water and no shots? Instinctively one has no doubt.

And Bill Gates spends, if my recollection is correct, less than 1% of his total on water and sanitation. That may be fair sum, but it is lip service with his total.

 

[editor]

And Bill Gates spends, if my recollection is correct, less than 1% of his total on water and sanitation. That may be fair sum, but it is lip service with his total.

Water, Hygiene and Sanitation
The Foundation is giving the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development US$1,200,000 over 3 years to find new, sustainable ways to make water, sanitation and hygiene services safer and more affordable.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_&_Melinda_Gates_Foundation

"Fair sum"



How much have you given Jazzz?

 

[kyser_soze]

You need both. One without the other is pointless.

More to the point, no one else is going to do this.

 

[DotCommunist]

In a way he is robbing from the rich (who foolishly opt to be early adopters of his malware) and giving to the poor.

 

[spacemonkey]

In a way he is robbing from the rich (who foolishly opt to be early adopters of his malware) and giving to the poor.

He also gives viruses to the rich, and reduces viruses in the poor.

 

[mitochondria]

He also gives viruses to the rich, and reduces viruses in the poor.

 

[Shippou-Sensei]

plus he is even kinda funny

 

[Yuwipi Woman]

Proof that smoking dope will ruin your life....

 

[sihhi]

More to the point, no one else is going to do this.

That's because no one else can since he has accumulated and sucked up so much wealth.

Mankind passed the point in the early 1980s where each human could have water, food, basic injections housing, books with the resources on earth.

His rotten system has denied people ever since.

Bill Gates if he was serious which he isn't would abandon all his wealth and place it under direct democratic control of people in all the countries' whose labour he has exploited.

 

[Blagsta]

Look, we can have the debate about whether vaccines are beneficial or harmful many times over. But what really cannot be denied at all is that clean water/sanitation is far, far more beneficial to health than any number of these shots. Suppose you have the choice - filthy water for life and any vaccine you wished, or clean water and no shots? Instinctively one has no doubt.

And Bill Gates spends, if my recollection is correct, less than 1% of his total on water and sanitation. That may be fair sum, but it is lip service with his total.

shut up you knob

 

[editor]

Bill Gates if he was serious which he isn't would abandon all his wealth and place it under direct democratic control of people in all the countries' whose labour he has exploited.

Yeah, cos that'll work just fine won't it?



Oh, and considering the sums of money and the energy he's putting into this, I'd say he's fairly serious about it.

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

This isn't charity, it's poison.

Awwww, bless.

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

That's because no one else can since he has accumulated and sucked up so much wealth.

Mankind passed the point in the early 1980s where each human could have water, food, basic injections housing, books with the resources on earth.

His rotten system has denied people ever since.

Bill Gates if he was serious which he isn't would abandon all his wealth and place it under direct democratic control of people in all the countries' whose labour he has exploited.

10 BILLION dollars and still twats on here find a way to moan, awesome

 

[kyser_soze]

Mankind passed the point in the early 1980s where each human could have water, food, basic injections housing, books with the resources on earth.

This is actually wrong, but hey don't worry about that.

 

[sihhi]

Yeah, cos that'll work just fine won't it?



Oh, and considering the sums of money and the energy he's putting into this, I'd say he's fairly serious about it.

He's serious about his foundation and the prestige he will derive from it, but he's not serious about public health - for children or adults.

His Foundation is one which is parasitic upon poverty - poverty which CEOs like him create.

On food:

You know as the food crisis has intensified during the last year, food prices have doubled. But we've also seen the corporate profits driving the food system double. I think we now have a major contest between two futures. There's the future that you and I are talking about and living in. It's a future of providing food security to the last child on the basis of people working lovingly with the land. More farmers growing good food, growing organic food, and this will drive away hunger and food scarcity.

I really find the United Nation's millennium goals highly un-ambitious because seven or eight years ago they talked only about halving the number of people who go to bed hungry. Well, with ecological farming and biodiversity agriculture we are not only doubling and tripling but we could increase food production five-fold and nutritional production even higher because the foods grown organically have much higher levels of nutrition. That's the way to address the problem of hunger. That's the way to make sure society does not neglect people.

Of course there is another agenda. And that agenda will attempt to use the crisis it has created to grab more of the food and agrarian economy. Look at what happened at the June Summit on climate and food. The biggest winner was Fortune's foremost Bill Gates and his foundation who wants to sell more chemical fertilizers to Africa, and then commercialize the food supply for Africa.

On health:

Operations set up by aid organizations thus attract the scarce supply of medical professionals, diverting resources from standard clinics and potentially reducing the care available to the local population.

“Instead of setting a hodgepodge of targets aimed at fighting single diseases, the world health community should focus on achieving two basic goals: increased maternal survival and increased overall life expectancy,” the article states. By diverting medical staff from overseeing births and battling childhood diseases, patchwork treatment of high-profile issues may reduce the overall health in impoverished nations.

.....

The foundation’s endowment stands at over $60 billion. This is greater than the gross domestic product of 70 percent of the world’s nations. Gates and his family exercise control over this vast section of economic life like lords over a fiefdom. Their will is law, and those who benefit from the foundation’s beneficence are to be grateful. The web site’s section on “our values” reads, “To whom much has been given, much is expected.”

What exactly are the “interests and passions” of Mr. Gates and his wife? Bill Gates is the wealthiest man in the world. He made his fortune though his shrewd and brutal business practices, cashing in on the work of thousands of brilliant but nameless people to establish a monopoly in the computer operating system and office software sectors. His wealth, like that of the giant US drug companies, was made and preserved through the restriction and monopolization of intellectual property.

What happens when such a person opens a charity whose top priority is combating AIDS, a disease that kills thousands of people needlessly because pharmaceutical companies use their monopoly power to restrict the production of inexpensive generic drugs?

As Daniel Berman, deputy director in South Africa for Doctors Without Borders, explained to the LA Times, “The Gates Foundation is in a position to change the dynamic, to make sure that drugs get first to the places they are most needed. But this conflicts with the interests of Microsoft.”

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2007/jan2007/gate-j22.shtml


His Foundation creates the problems which it then "solves" with great fanfare.

I remember him boldly declaring that the Millennium Development Goals couldn't possibly not be achieved.

Serious epidemiologists recognise unaccountable foundations

 

[sihhi]

This is actually wrong, but hey don't worry about that.

In any serious analysis of anyone about the issues, the diversion of resources into the vast ineffiencies of state capitalism would be avoided. It's based on a broad equality, the disabled and sick would receive more than others.

Perhaps you're right on a technicality, the so-called "problem of scarcity" was in fact resolved earlier than the 1980s.

 

[sihhi]

10 BILLION dollars and still twats on here find a way to moan, awesome

It's not moaning, the point is for all of us here to analyse more deeply what's going on.

If someone tosses you a £2 coin in the street you might be happy, but if you recognise him as the same guy who's been organising burglaries on your house and your neighbours' house over the past years, you'll approach the situation differently.

 

[ska invita]

Look, we can have the debate about whether vaccines are beneficial or harmful many times over. But what really cannot be denied at all is that clean water/sanitation is far, far more beneficial to health than any number of these shots. Suppose you have the choice - filthy water for life and any vaccine you wished, or clean water and no shots? Instinctively one has no doubt.

I think that's a fair point. But its also fair that there are many easily curable diseases, and if thats what they want to spend his money on its up to them.

I agree though, if I were in that position, it would be better to spend money on infrastructure that would last into the future, (such as water), rather than pharmaceuticals that gets used up and leave the next generation wanting. But still, I guess its up to them.