Bill Gates has issued a chilling warning to governments across the world that the death of children will only increase in funding isn't provided, as 5 million kids are set to die before their fifth birthday this year.
While Bill Gates might have earned his fortune by co-founding one of the most important tech companies ever in the form of Microsoft, recent years have seen him give significant parts of his fortune away in an attempt to make the world better.
He does this through the Gates Foundation which he started with his now ex-wife Melinda French Gates, and recently vowed that he wants to give all of his money away before he dies.
One of the key causes he has looked to tackle through philanthropic efforts is eliminating early age deaths across the world, and key to that is convincing major governments to maintain their foreign aid funding which has notably diminished in recent times.
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As reported by Fortune, Gates has released the 2025 edition of his Foundation's 'Goalkeeper's Report', an annual call-to-action meant to inspire global leaders, and it asserts that the world "can't stop at almost."
According to the report, 2025 marks the first year of the 21st century where the yearly total of child deaths will increase, jumping from 4.6 million in 2024 to an estimated 4.8 million by the end of the year.
This particular statistic measures deaths before a child can reach the age of five, as Gates mourns the loss of children who are "gone before they ever learn to write their name or tie their shoes."
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He calls on governments to 'stop this reversal' with critical funding, illustrating that "with proven solutions and next-generation innovations that do more with less, we can save millions of children's lives, protect the progress we've fought so hard for, and wipe out diseases that have plagued humanity for generations."
Key to this increase in child deaths and 'reversal' of trends is likely to do with funding cuts from places like the Trump administration, who notably slashed the amount that the US government spends on USAID through Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which Gates himself noted was 'killing children'.
Global development assistance for health has fallen 26.9 percent below 2024 totals, and if this decreases by 20 percent in the long term, this could result in an additional 12 million child deaths in the next two decades, with 16 million children dying if cuts reached 30 percent.
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"If we take this path, we're the generation that almost ended preventable child deaths. Almost eradicated polio. Almost wiped malaria off the map. Almost made HIV history. But we can't stop at almost," Gates asserts.