The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is one of the wealthiest charities in the world, and their aid is spread out across countries and issues, from K-12 education in the U.S. to malaria research in Africa. But during the unprecedented pandemic brought on by COVID-19, the organization is shifting most of its power to tackle that specific problem.
“This has the foundation’s total attention,” said Bill Gates in a new interview with the Financial Times. This pledge comes a week after the foundation already increased its commitment of funds and resources, as outlined in a press release.
According to the Financial Times, the Gates Foundation has an endowment over $40 billion, and it has already given $250 million in direct relief during the coronavirus fallout — but the efforts extend far beyond monetary donations.
“We’ve taken an organization that was focused on HIV and malaria and polio eradication, and almost entirely shifted it to work on this,” he told the paper. He added, “Even our non-health related work, like higher education and K-12 [schools], is completely switched around to look at how you facilitate online learning.”
This extraordinary move stems partly from concerns that the global economy will lose “tens of trillions of dollars,” according to Gates. It’s also being offered despite the unfounded conspiracy theories about his role in the pandemic that have been proliferating recently.
“This whole thing is so awful, and the notion that anybody’s getting positive visibility for it seems very paradoxical,” he said. Sure, it’s paradoxical, but if he thinks no one is getting positive visibility for COVID-19 efforts, he must not be watching SNL.
Subscribe here for our free daily newsletter.
Thanks for reading InsideHook. Sign up for our daily newsletter and be in the know.
