Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

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Bill Gates Senior: Bill Junior Was a Brat

Bill Sr. recounts raising his 'smart-ass' son

(Newser) - Bill Gates stopped being a kid right about age 11, his father tells Wall Street Journal. And then he turned into a royal pain, at least for a while. In the most famous bit of family lore, Bill Gates Sr. says he had to chuck a glass of cold water...

Gates Lets Mosquitoes Fly at Audience

Stunt underscores malaria threat shouldn't be for 'only poor people'

(Newser) - Bill Gates had the audience buzzing yesterday as he released a jar of mosquitoes at the TED2009 conference in California during a presentation on eradicating malaria, reports MSNBC. The bugs were not carrying the disease. "Not only poor people should experience this," Gates explained, according to a witness...

Watershed Vaccine May End Malaria Toll

If trials work as expected, shots could save millions of children

(Newser) - Scientists have developed a promising vaccine against malaria, a devastating disease that kills a milion people a year, most of them young children. Trials of the breakthrough vaccine enter the final phase next year and it could be widely available by 2012, reports the Los Angeles Times. Successful trials have...

Big Players Reel in Charity Spending

Drop-off in corporate giving leaves groups scrambling

(Newser) - Charities used to getting much of their money from major corporations and private foundations are feeling the economic downturn, the Wall Street Journal reports. Bill Gates’ foundation plans to give fewer grants next year, and other large donors are honoring existing pledges but refusing to make new ones. “You...

Nonprofit Workers Favor Dems
 Nonprofit Workers Favor Dems 
Oct 31, 2008 8:00 PM CDT

Nonprofit Workers Favor Dems

Charity employees are more likely to donate money to the left side of the aisle, study finds

(Newser) - People in the charitable world lean heavily Democrat and love Barack Obama, but try to keep their affiliation low-key to avoid insulting the other side, the Chronicle of Philanthropy reports. A new study shows that 88% of foundation worker donations went to Dems, enriching Obama's effort by $399,000 and...

Gates Gambles Big on Bold Medical Probes

$10M in public-health grants eschew peer review for innovation

(Newser) - The Gates Foundation has awarded more than $10 million to medical researchers with quirky ideas that might not be funded otherwise, the Washington Post reports. The initiative, dubbed Grand Challenges Explorations, offered a simple 2-page application and vetting by entrepreneurs, not medical professionals. “Peer review—by definition almost—excludes...

Malaria Fight Gets $3B Booster Shot
Malaria Fight Gets $3B Booster Shot
Sep 27, 2008 12:05 PM CDT

Malaria Fight Gets $3B Booster Shot

Initiative will focus on Africa, stress the need for persistence

(Newser) - The global fight against malaria will get an unprecedented $3 billion push from a global alliance of nonprofits, financial institutions, and governments, the Wall Street Journal reports, with a focus on prolonging the effort beyond initial successes. The Global Malaria Action Plan aims for multibillion-dollar yearly funding through 2020, and...

Gates Tops Rich List With $57B

Leads Forbes ranking for 15th year

(Newser) - Microsoft founder Bill Gates leads the latest Forbes list of America's richest people with a fortune estimated to be $57 billion. It's the 15th year in a row that the visionary behind the computer revolution has topped the ratings. But the rich are not getting richer, Forbes reveals. Several fortunes...

'Saving' Public Schools Not a Money Thing

Better education can't be legislated, or bought—parents have to make the effort

(Newser) - As dissatisfaction with the nation’s No Child Left Behind policy grows, it seems educators, politicians, and businessmen all have their own take on how to “save” the US public school system—with little consensus. Gary Stager, in Good, examines the overwhelmingly complex difficulties facing the nation’s ailing...

Microsoft Without Bill Gates? His Final Week Begins

The 52-year-old has slowly backed away from the software company's operations

(Newser) - This will be Bill Gates’ last Monday at Microsoft, the company that the 52-year-old founded with business partner Paul Allen as a teenager. He’s retiring Friday from Microsoft’s day-to-day business and beginning full-time work with his $37.3 billion philanthropic organization, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. He's...

Cheap Malaria Drug Holds Promise for Millions

It's based on 2000-year-old herbal remedy

(Newser) - The lives of millions of children  may be saved by a new technique for producing a malaria drug at a 10th of the cost of current treatments, making it accessible the world's most impoverished people, reports the Independent.  The technique involves inserting a dozen synthetic genes into yeast cells,...

Gates Charity Creates New African Woes

AIDS dollars distort fragile health systems, undermining basic care

(Newser) - The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has given $8.5 billion to global health causes and is slowly defeating AIDS in Africa, but it’s creating unexpected new problems for the continent, the LA Times reports. By pouring money into the treatment of AIDS, TB and malaria, it has lured...

Gates Aims $100M at Polio
Gates Aims $100M at Polio
Nov 27, 2007 4:30 AM CST

Gates Aims $100M at Polio

Foundation aims to eradicate disease

(Newser) - The world stands at the brink of eradicating polio, Bill Gates says, and his foundation yesterday awarded $100 million toward that end. One of the foundation's largest challenge grants will fund programs in four countries where the disease is still epidemic, notably Nigeria. The Rotary Foundation received the grant and...

He Quietly Gave Away Billions
He Quietly Gave Away Billions
Sep 29, 2007 10:39 AM CDT

He Quietly Gave Away Billions

But now the secretive philanthropist spills the beans behind his generosity

(Newser) - Chuck Feeney’s foundation gave $458 million in grants last year—third only to Ford and Gates—but very few know the secretive philanthropist’s name. Having thus far shielded himself from fame, Feeney gets some star treatment in a new biography that sheds light on his good deeds and...

The Heart of Geekness Will Save Us All

Nerds grasp large-scale human suffering much better, Wired says

(Newser) - Why is Bill Gates, “practically a social cripple,” going to save the world? Because of numbers, says Clive Thompson in Wired. More than most, the Microsoft maverick -- who spearheads tireless crusades against poverty and AIDS -- can comprehend large quantities, while research shows that most of us...

Gates Gives $105 Mil to Track Global Public Health

UW center will eye effectiveness of giving

(Newser) - The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has given $105 million to the  University of Washington to study the effectiveness of public health programs around the world. The money will be used to create a center to track such measures as child mortality, the prevalence of major diseases  and the availability...

Buffett Holdings Tie Gates To Darfur Crisis

Berkshire owns $3.3B stake in firm said to fund militia

(Newser) - A Berkshire Hathaway investment in a Sudanese oil company is posing thorny problems for the Gates Foundation, the Los Angeles Times reports. Warren Buffet's investment outfit is the largest independent shareholder in PetroChina, whose parent company the U.N. and U.S. say funds Sudan's janjaweed militia—a stark contrast...

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