February 1st, 2010
© DVIDSHUB
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has committed $4.5 billion to vaccines for the Third World over the last decade. Is that smart? Shouldn't we be providing basics (like food and shelter) instead of prescription drugs or vaccines?
Having worked in the non-profit sector, I hear these sorts of arguments from time to time. The question is simplistic. And just the way it's phrased is part of the problem. Whenever a question begins by acknowledging limitations before vision, the question is flawed. Haiti, Laos, Burkina Faso, or whatever Third World nation you want to consider – it needs both. The question has to be asked for an agency or organiztion, not for Namibia or Ecuador. The Gates Foundation has to decide what it does best and do that first. Someone else will show up with tests and canned tunafish – maybe because the Gates Foundation looks for partners.
As a larger community of non-profits we have to identify the needs. And most Third World countries definitely need both – the food and shelter that on the one hand and medical supplies on the other. Having decided that, we fail in our mandate to be visionaries if we don't begin looking for a way to meet both needs.