Melinda Moree met plenty of naysayers who dismissed the prospects of a malaria vaccine. Then she encountered Bill Gates.
No one had developed a human vaccine against a parasite like malaria before, and the monetary incentives simply did not exist for pharmaceutical companies to develop drugs targeted at poor children. Development would require cooperation among scientists, drug companies, health groups and international governments -- an alliance so large it didn't seem possible, she recalled someone telling Gates.
"Of course it is," Gates countered, according to Moree, now director of the PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative in Seattle, which along with other groups has received nearly $500 million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to develop, test, manufacture and eventually distribute a malarial vaccine. "There's something about vision and belief that these things are possible," Moree said.
The co-founder of Microsoft has given $25.9 billion of his personal wealth to the foundation and has pledged to give billions of dollars more to devote to several dozen specific programs, such as minority scholarships, clean water initiatives, updated computer systems in libraries and the development of a variety of vaccines.
[Excerpt of article by Yuki Noguchi, Washington Post]
No comments:
Post a Comment