Bill Gates urges rich countries to fund coronavirus vaccine search
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Microsoft founder Bill Gates has urged rich countries to put “a few per cent” of their gross domestic product towards finding and distributing a Covid-19 vaccine, highlighting a potentially huge shortfall in current investment levels.
In a video interview with the Financial Times, Mr Gates said that despite the economic strain developed countries were under, there was a “compelling” case to spend tens of billions of dollars to support the manufacturing and distribution of a vaccine that would also be accessible for the poorest countries. “When you’re talking about making it easier to not have infection coming back into your country, you can make both a humanitarian and a self-interested argument that even a few per cent [of GDP] going against that for the rich countries would be a wise investment,” Mr Gates said.
The Gates Foundation was one of the creators of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovation (Cepi) to develop a Covid-19 vaccine.
The UK, Canada, Germany and Norway are among the countries funding Cepi’s search for a vaccine, with pledges totalling $690m. Cepi, which is an alliance of governments, the private sector and charities, is running eight Covid-19 vaccine development projects and has made an urgent appeal for $2bn for this research.
