Fighting AIDS Is Melinda Gates' Priority

In the battle to stop AIDS, no private partnership has fought harder than the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which has invested more than $2 billion worldwide. Last night, CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric spoke exclusively with Melinda Gates about why she has made fighting AIDS such a priority.

Gates: Bill and I founded the foundation on the premise that all lives on this planet are equal, and we really believe that. AIDS is one of the biggest scourges that our planet faces today, and it's one of the most critical diseases. That's why we've chosen to tackle it with the foundation.

Couric: I know that much of the funding for the foundation goes to develop a vaccine to prevent the spread of HIV. How close are we to developing such a vaccine?

Gates: Unfortunately, on the front of the vaccine, it is the ultimate solution, but it's over a decade away, which is why we think (it's) all the more reason that today, we really also need to focus on prevention — making sure people understand what is available to them today to stop spreading the disease.

Couric: At the same time, one of your leading researchers, Dr. David Ho, who we just profiled, says the virus seems to be winning — especially since so many people die every year from AIDS. Have we turned the tide at all?

Gates: I think we have a long way to go, to be honest, to turn the tide. I think that we're making strides in certain countries, I think, in places like Thailand and Uganda, where they started to break the epidemic early in those countries, those are absolutely places where you see some promise. A place like India, you need to get in there, and we're starting to, to break the back of the disease before it gets into the widespread population. But that's the way to do it, because once it becomes, as we're seeing widespread in Africa, it's significantly reducing the lifespan of people in those countries. It's a very difficult disease.

Couric: Your foundation has given you an extraordinary opportunity. I'm just curious — on a personal level, how has this work changed you?

Gates: You can't travel to the developing world and not be touched by it. You can't sit down with a mother in a village and hear what's going on for her in that village when she has AIDS or her husband has it or her child has it. And it makes me all the more impassioned here when I'm back in Seattle when we are putting our best hearts and minds and working with the best scientists to make sure we're trying to really solve these really difficult diseases for those women that they are facing out in those villages.

Couric: Melinda Gates, thank you so much for talking to us on World AIDS Day.

Gates: Thanks for having me join you.

[nothappyatall]

AIDS is a 100% preventable disease, this is not some disease that hits innocent unknowing victims like cancer, heart attack, diabetes, epilepsy, MS etc this is a disease that has been all over the media for over 20 YEARS as to it's cause- unprotected *** with another human! If people don't know by NOW to wear condoms and use them then why should anyone spend money on programs to cure their stupidity?

Naturally the gates spend money on some FOREIGN country, lord knows we certainly don't have ANY homeless, jobless, or people *HERE* in the US who need money for things like cancer surgery, radiation treatments, medications. This amount of money could help find CURES for cancer- something that can strike ANYONE anywhere at any age, AIDS strikes idiots who don't wear condoms.

Your money spent on poorly written microcrud software is what made the Gate's rich, I use a MAC exclusively and I never buy new, I don't support the rich buggers who just get rich off our backs and then send this money to some foreign contry when we have tens of thousands HERE in bad conditions, people living on the streets and worse.

[mh4cbs1]

These are just a couple of Billionaires making themselves feel good. What else are they going to do with the $50 Billion dollars that our ridiculous system gives them.

But while they give some of their billions away, they don't ask questions like "Why is the US spending $500 Billion EACH YEAR on War? What if we cut it in half and spent $250 Billion on PEACE?

Thats right, create a "Department of Peace" and require that it get at least as much money as our "Department of Defense". (Of course corporate-run media and corporate-owned politicans would scream and holler, which is why it won't happen).

But if Gates wanted to spend a few Billion to educate Amrericans on just how evil and insidious their government has become, perhaps there could be a transformation of our society in a way that would make Peace and Justice the priority, instead of corporate profits.

But, alas no, the Gates will spend all their billions making relatively minor and temporary inroads to the horrific inequality found across the globe. And they will feel important, and they will feel good about themselves, and they will feel that their obscene wealth is justified. But the US will keep on fighting the Wars for Empire, Global warming will accelerate, and Corporations will continue to exploit the globe, keeping the poor impoverished and making more billionaires in the process (who can then feel good when they give away a few of their billions).

[elgraz]

Don't blame the Drug companies. Blame the pseudo-politically incorrect Gates's and other billionaries who don't know where to spend their money and the Bush government both of whom sqander our tax dollars on war in Iraq and aid to unstable and insane countries;who steal the funds from the needy there. We in the USA are a bunch of saps and always will be.

[lestb35]

The Gates Foundation is the future of responsible charity. I will bet on them to use $ effectively. And as far as the pharmaceutical profits, the more they make the more they spend on research and finding new cures.

[gramto7]

As much good as Bill and Melinda Gates, Warren Buffet, and Bill Clinton are doing, it is truly a shame that our pharmaceutical companies do not see fit to lower their prices enough to help out significantly. Mr. Clinton had to go to companies in India to get medications for children with AIDS/HIV at a reduced rate (16 cents/day) so that kids in poorer countries could have hope. That is shameful. As much money as these companies are making off Americans, they should be able to help out these kids.