Bill Gates Explains Why He Gives to End Diseases Overseas

Attending a conference on global health, Bill Gates spoke with NPR about his giving approach and why so much of his foundation’s money has gone toward ending diseases in developing countries.

At the Global Health Product Development Forum, Mr. Gates said that many of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s health interventions focus on saving lives for less than $2,000 per life saved. “Any country where we can save a life for a few thousand dollars, we’ll do it,” he says. “It turns out the place you can do that—really make dramatic reductions in the number of children who die—is the really poor countries.

Mr. Gates spoke on the foundation’s continued effort eradicate polio worldwide, despite setbacks in Nigeria, Pakistan, and Syria, and the importance of developing vaccines to combat outbreaks of malaria in Africa.