Billionaire philanthropist and co-founder of Microsoft, Bill Gates recently said that by next year, the coronavirus pandemic may end in many countries. He is hopeful that a coronavirus vaccine will soon be created, and that by 2022 the world will see the end of Covid-19. Although Gates said that the economic damage caused by the pandemic would be difficult to reverse, he said the pandemic opened up an innovation pipeline on scaling up diagnostics, new treatments, and research into vaccines. His remarks came during an interview with Wired, an American magazine.
It is worth remembering that the Gates Foundation has been focusing on and financing coronavirus vaccine studies. Just last week, India’s Pune-based Serum Institute said it would receive $150 million in funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Gave International Vaccine Alliance to make 100 million coronavirus do for India and other emerging economies by 2021.
Two of the candidate vaccines to be manufactured by India’s Serum Institute are AstraZeneca and Novavax, and they will both be priced at $3 per dose. It is to be made available in more than 90 countries. Gavi, backed by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, co-leads Covax — the campaign to ensure the Covid-19 vaccine is distributed efficiently and fairly around the globe. The other groups involved are the World Health Organization (WHO) and Alliance for Advances in Disease Preparedness (CEPI).
