Bill Gates faces backlash after saying no to sharing vaccine formulas with the public and the global poor to end the pandemic

Bill Gates recently turned his $55 million vaccine investment in Pfizer’s partner, BioNTech, into over $550 million in just under two years. Now, billionaire and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates is facing backlash for an interview with Sky News in which he said lifting patent protections on vaccine technology to share vaccine formulas with the world would not be helpful.

Gates’ response is not surprising considering that Gates made a massive fortune largely from intellectual property laws that turned Microsoft software innovations into tens of billions of dollars in personal wealth.

During a Sunday interview with Sky News, Gates was directly asked if he thought it “would be helpful” to have vaccine recipes be shared, Gates quickly answered: “No.” Health advocates quickly blast Gates for saying patent protections on life-saving vaccines must remain

When asked to explain why not, Gates said:

“Well, there’s only so many vaccine factories in the world and people are very serious about the safety of vaccines. And so moving something that had never been done — moving a vaccine, say, from a [Johnson & Johnson] factory into a factory in India — it’s novel — it’s only because of our grants and expertise that that can happen at all.”

In a scathing indictment of Gates’ defense of the status quo, Dr. Tara Van Ho (Dr), Co-President Global Biz human rights Scholars Association and Co-Director Essex BHR Project, wrote on Twitter:

“Gates speaks as if all the lives being lost in India are inevitable but eventually the West will help when in reality the US & UK are holding their feet on the neck of developing states by refusing to break TRIPS protections. It’s disgusting.”

Gates speaks as if all the lives being lost in India are inevitable but eventually the West will help when in reality the US & UK are holding their feet on the neck of developing states by refusing to break TRIPS protections. It's disgusting.
https://t.co/sNdFanmIKH

— Tara Van Ho (@TaraVanHo) April 25, 2021

You can watch Gates’ interview with SkyNews below.