On the occasion of its 25th year, the Gates Foundation has made a new commitment to accelerate its mission to help all people live healthy, productive lives by spending $200 billion over the next 20 years. The decision marks a major acceleration in the foundation’s work and sets a new date of 2045 to sunset its operations. The historic announcement, which represents the largest philanthropic commitment in modern history, was shared in a post by foundation Chair Bill Gates.
“There are too many urgent problems to solve for me to hold onto resources that could be used to help people. That is why I have decided to give my money back to society much faster than I had originally planned,” wrote Mr Gates. “I will give away virtually all my wealth through the Gates Foundation over the next 20 years to the cause of saving and improving lives around the world.”
The accelerated timeline was affirmed by the foundation’s governing board with a change to the foundation’s charter, which had said the organization would sunset 20 years after Gates’ death. The funding pledged exceeds the foundation’s current endowment, with the balance coming over time from Gates’ personal fortune.
“A few years ago, I began to rethink that [timeline]. More recently, with the input from our board, I now believe we can achieve the foundation’s goals on a shorter timeline, especially if we double down on key investments and provide more certainty to our partners,” he said.
While the foundation’s strategies are not changing, over the next two decades, the foundation will work together with its partners to make as much progress as possible towards three primary goals:
Help end preventable deaths of moms and babies
Ensure the next generation grows up without having to suffer from deadly infectious diseases
Lift millions of people out of poverty, putting them on a path to prosperity
“During the first 25 years of the Gates Foundation—powered in part by the generosity of Warren Buffett—we gave away more than $100 billion,” wrote Mr Gates. “Over the next two decades, we will double our giving. The exact amount will depend on the markets and inflation, but I expect the foundation will spend more than $200 billion between now and 2045. This figure includes the balance of the endowment and my future contributions.”
The shift in the sunset date is driven by urgency and opportunity. The foundation hopes to capitalize on the extraordinary global progress in health and development between 2000 and 2025—a period when child deaths were halved, deaths from deadly infectious diseases were significantly reduced, and hundreds of millions of people rose out of poverty.
Since 2000, the Gates Foundation contributed to saving 82 million lives through its support of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Together with its partners, the foundation also helped develop more than 100 innovations, including vaccines, diagnostic tools, and treatments designed to meet the needs of people living in low- and middle-income countries. Taken together, these innovations—and the people who made them possible—helped change the trajectory of global health. Still, there are hundreds more innovations in the pipeline.
“The needs at this time are greater than any we’ve seen in the lifetime of the foundation, but the achievements of the past 25 years have shown that tremendous progress is still possible,” said Mark Suzman, CEO and board member of the Gates Foundation. “That’s why, in the next two decades, working in close collaboration with our partners, we’ll deploy these new innovations and apply 25 years of learnings and progress to making an even bigger difference.”
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