this post was submitted on 13 Mar 2024
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Malaria (fedia.io)
submitted 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLkbWUNQbgk&t=308s

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[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Still probably a net positive, though. Hell, he could kill 110 Million people added to every sars-cov-2 death combined and still be net positive. Good person? Debatably no. Best billionaire? Yeah.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

That's one stupid argument backed with made up numbers there

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Covid19 has killed less than 8 Million people total, and you can argue in good faith that Bill Gates would be responsible for some of those deaths by advocating for full commercialization of the vaccine.

Yeah, it's a lot, but compared to a random estimate from The Guardian of 122 Million lives saved by the Gates Foundation... yeah.

Now, I realize some people would say saving any number of lives wouldn't justify murder, but anybody who says Bill Gates is anything other than a net positive impact on the world is out of their fucking head.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Some people would say that he has given negative 130 billion, or whatever his net worth is right now

I wouldn't go that extreme, but still think he has had net negative effect in the world

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

  1. I would pay 130 billion to save 122 Million lives. That's only 1066 USD per life saved. You must be greedy af if you think that's a bad deal.

  2. That's not how stocks work. He hasn't taken 130 Bn USD. Most of his 129.2 Bn net worth is unrealized gains in the form of shares of companies such as Microsoft, meaning when or if it ever becomes income he will likely donate that as well, in fact he has promised to do so on many occasions. To date, Bill has donated 59 Bn USD to charities, the vast majority of his income.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Okay I take that as you did not read the article, but only the misleading title, if you claim that Bill and Melinda saved 122m infants...

The article says that infant deaths (0-5yo) have halved from 1990 to 2015. From 1990 to 2000 the number already gone from 12 million down to around 9.5 million yearly. This is when Bill and Melinda Foundation was founded and they started pouring money on vaccinations which is good of course.

So yes, they've certainly done a part in reducing infant death rates, but they're only a small part of it. And most of the money invested wasn't even theirs, but donation from Warren Buffet who actually donated away most of his wealth.