How Bill and Melinda Gates Spent Billions to Help Vaccinate Three-Quarters of a Billion Children

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has spent 20 years – and $53.8 billion – focusing on global health and U.S. education. Their biggest success: vaccinations that helped prevent 13 million deaths.

Upon realizing that children were dying from easily-preventable diseases, the foundation created a new alliance, Gavi, on an experiment to raise funds for vaccines. Though they initially had no idea whether their project could work, they successfully managed to vaccinate more than three-quarters of a billion children, saving millions of lives.

“The goal isn’t just incremental progress,” write Bill and Melinda Gates in a letter. “It’s to put the full force of our efforts and resources behind the big bets that, if successful, will save and improve lives.”

The next issues the foundation plans to focus on are climate change and gender equality, taking more “big bets” on projects that may not be successful –but if they are, they are sure to yield an enormous impact.