Headline, December 20 2020/ ''' '' MELINDA'S HONOURING * MARVELS '' '''

''' '' MELINDA'S 

HONOURING * MARVELS '' '''

PULVERIZING POVERTY : WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED to, and in Great India, Proud Pakistan, Myanmar, Afghanistan, Yemen, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal, The whole of Africa, Latin America?

! FOUNDER FRAMERS ! : '' TO KNOW THAT EVEN ONE LIFE HAS BREATHED easier because you have lived - this is to have succeeded.'' And that's Ralph Waldo Emerson for you all.

Melinda Gates says the quote keeps ringing in her ears. ''That's my definition of success since high school,'' she said.

'So if I have an extra dollar, or a thousand dollars, or a millions dollars, or in may case, which is absurd, a billion dollars to plow back into making the world better for other people, that's what I am going to do.''

The World Students Society rises to give Melinda Gates a resounding standing ovation and assure her of her highest esteemed respects and all prayers for her and family.

As the wife Bill Gates, the Microsoft co-founder, Ms. Gates now has the capital, clout and connections to have an impact however, she pleases. She is one of the richest people in the world, a leading voice in global health and an advocate for women's economic empowerment.

As a face of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, she is also a lightning rod for critics who say billionaires have too much sway over public policy, as well as for conspiracy theorists who harbor darker fantasies.

The Gates have been sounding the alarm about infectious diseases - and the need to fund vaccination efforts - since the late 1990s. That was when, during travels to Africa and India, the extreme poverty they saw prompted them to reflect on how they might use their wealth to make a difference.

''We just kept saying : 'What's going on here? Why isn't the infrastructure here for roads? Why aren't we seeing more people who are doing well economically. What happened? ' '' Ms Gates said.

''We started to think about what philanthropy's role might be and realized that the best place to intervene, if you want somebody to live a full and productive life, was to start with health.''

Since then, the Gates Foundation has given away more than $55 billion, much of it directed at efforts to eradicate disease in the developing world. It has helped to all but wipe out polio, and has poured money into programs aimed at ensuring that poor countries have early access to vaccines.

When the coronavirus pandemic hit, the foundation turned its attention the vast and complex project of developing vaccines for the new virus, and ensuring that they could be widely distributed.

So far, the foundation has contributed nearly $500 million to coronavirus response efforts. Earlier investment by the foundation are paying off as well - one of the drug makers it previously funded, BioNTech, has developed a successful Covid-19 vaccine with Pfizer.

Ms. Gates is more optimistic today than she was a couple of months ago. Vaccines that appear to be safe and effective are beginning to be deployed. Treatments for the virus have improved. And President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr has made beating back the pandemic his top priority.

''The Biden administration will re-enter the global stage and be a participant in making sure the whole world gets vaccines,'' Ms. Gates said. She added that the virus team assembled by Mr. Biden was ''a very strong, eminent group who are wise and thoughtful and very reasonable.''

''We should have said sooner that if you're going out, wear a mask. I mean, the fact we're even still debating that in the United States makes zero sense. Most people get in a car today and know that to save their own life, they ought to wear a seatbelt.

Most people would agree that having the drunken drivers on the road is a bad thing, not only individually but for us as a society, because it causes more deaths.

Well, masks are just the right thing to do right now. It is insane that we're at this point in this pandemic, in the United States, and we're still debating whether people should wear a mask when they go in a store to buy their groceries.

And then, also, Ms. Gates was realistic about the challenges ahead. Vaccine hesitancy is on the rise, disinformation is running rampant on social media, many Americans still refuse to wear masks, and cases may just get surging. ''We still have a stretch of very dark months ahead of us,'' she said

''And I cry a lot, and then I come back and I say, ''How do I take what that person shared with me and what I learned, and how do I plow that back into the work try to make the world better, or to convince a global leader that -

That they ought to give more money to malaria, or care about people getting a vaccine on the other side of the world, or care about a child not getting proper education in cities?''

I just try to constantly remember that it's a privilege.''

The Honor and Serving of the Latest Global Operational Research on Great Humans in service of Mankind, and The State-of-the-World, continues. The World Students Society thanks author David Gelles.

With respectful dedication to the Leaders, Students, professors and Teachers of the world. See Ya all  prepare and register for Great Global Elections on The World Students Society : wssciw.blogspot.com and Twitter - !E-WOW! - The Ecosystem 2011 :

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