Gates Blasts Rich Nations for Apathy
17/05/2005| IslamWeb
US computer billionaire Bill Gates yesterday accused rich countries of turning their back on deadly diseases affecting millions of poor people, as he announced an additional 250 million US dollar contribution for health research in developing countries. "If these epidemics were raging in the developed world, people with resources would see the suffering and insist that we stop it," Gates told the 192 nations attending the World Health Organisation's (WHO) annual assembly.
"But sometimes it seems that the rich world can't even see the developing world," he added in his keynote address.
The Microsoft creator's foundation has contributed 4.1 billion US dollar to programmes tackling HIV/Aids, malaria, tuberculosis and other diseases over the past five years.
In a speech to the opening session of the annual assembly, the world's richest man said a combination of "astonishing" scientific advances and rising global awareness of the suffering caused by disease gave real hope for progress.
"We are on the verge of taking historic steps to reduce disease in the developing world...(if) we match these accelerating capacities of science with the emerging moral awareness of global health inequities," he said.
The Gates Foundation is the world's wealthiest philanthropic organisation with assets worth 28bn US dollar. The pledge increases its funding commitment to unearthing solutions for 14 major health "challenges" to 450m from an initial 200m at the project's launch in late 2003. Gates has openly admitted that he hoped others would match his initiative.
Gates urged governments to "dramatically" increase financial efforts to fight disease and called for a boost for scientific research into diseases that "disproportionately affect the developing world".
"The world is failing billions of people. Rich governments are not fighting some of the world's most deadly diseases because rich countries don't have them."
"And many developing countries are not doing nearly enough to help improve the health of their own people," Gates added.
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