Gates: The Road Towards More Sustainable Development in the Era of the Affordable World and the Fewest Poverty Free World? Hears, Is That Possible

“This is a miraculous time,” he told me, with the most exciting work the foundation has ever done sitting in the R.&D. pipeline now, waiting to be delivered.

It was almost hard to keep up with his survey of breakthroughs: on H.I.V., on tuberculosis, but also on more obscure and neglected diseases like lymphatic filariasis and visceral leishmaniasis. He predicts that maternal-mortality rates in the developing world could be brought into rough parity with those in the rich world, and that childhood deaths could be cut in half.

Given the various cuts imposed by the Trump administration, Gates says he expects childhood mortality to go up by a million additional deaths per year.

Gates made a big noise when he mentioned that the richest man of the world was involved in the deaths of the world’s poor.

I thought there’d be, like, a 20 percent cut. Right now it’s like an 80 percent cut. I didn’t expect that. I don’t think anybody expected that. The executive branch did not have to follow the Congress’s instructions when it came to cutting money. I didn’t expect the research and trial networks to be going on that way.

A day before he’s supposed to fly and see Trump, and he’s like, Oh, my God, I’ve got to show that we’re serious about defense spending. He’s in some meetings saying, OK, how do I increase defense spending from 2.1 percent to 2.3 percent? And somebody says, We could cut the aid budget from 0.5 percent to 0.3 percent. Nobody says, Hey, what about those kids who won’t get vaccines?

The Gates Foundation and the Giving Pledge: A Conversation with Tim Gates About A.I., Musk, the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times

Throughout our conversation, he returned again and again to the promises of A.I. — not just in the area of drug discovery, but as part of a better delivery mechanism, to make sure that those in need can actually access the world’s most powerful tools.

Earlier this year, Gates told The Wall Street Journal that he was “frankly impressed” with the interest Trump expressed in the issues Gates brought up during a three-hour-long dinner last December. Months later, Trump and government efficiency czar Musk tore into federal funding — a move that “rattled” the Gates Foundation, as reported by the Times.

Gates said the reductions to U.S.A.I.D. are stunning. “I thought there’d be, like, a 20 percent cut. Instead, right now, it’s like an 80 percent cut. I didn’t expect that. I don’t think anybody expected that.”

Times reporter David Wallace-Wells then brings up Musk’s commitment to the Giving Pledge, to which Gates responds, “an unusual aspect of it You can wait until you die to fulfill the pledge. He adds, “So who knows? He could go on to be a great philanthropist. The world’s richest man has an involvement in the deaths of poor children.

Over the next 20 years Gates says he plans to give away his wealth to help people around the world. The Gates Foundation will officially close on December 31st, 2045, when Gates’ net worth will have dropped by 99 percent.