The world’s second richest man and founder of Microsoft, Bill Gates arrived in Ghana on Monday, for a day’s working visit.
This is the first time the founder of Microsoft is coming to Ghana for a private visit. Mr. Gates who arrived in the country yesterday evening, is expected to inspect some projects of “The Bill and Melinda Gate’s Foundation”.
The Foundation is currently offering support to disease control programmes under the Ministry of Health such as; Tuberculosis, Malaria and HIV.
He said in an article online prior to the visit: “I plan to share my experience in Ghana at the Global Vaccine Summit in Abu Dhabi April 24-25, where global health leaders will celebrate progress in immunization and demonstrate how the world is united to give all children a healthy start to life.”
The billionaire is impressed with how successful Ghana’s immunization program has fared so far.
He said: “Ghana, for example, polio was eliminated a decade ago and an outbreak in 2008 was quickly controlled. No child there has died from measles since 2002. And Ghana was the first country to launch two new vaccines last April, against rotavirus, which causes severe diarrhoea, and pneumococcal pneumonia”
The 2013 Forbes magazine’s second richest man set up the foundation in 1994 and is worth 36.2 billion dollars as at September 30 2012. It is ranked as one of the biggest philanthropic organizations in the world in terms of fund size.
It is controlled by three trustees namely; Bill Gates himself, his wife and the fourth richest man in the world, Warren Buffet.
Mr. Gates recently resigned as Chief Executive of Microsoft to take up a chairmanship role in the company and concentrate on his Foundation.
Source: Myjoyonline.com
