Microsoft founder Bill Gates accused Elon Musk of killing poor children as he announced that he would give away 99% of his fortune over the next 20 years and that the Gates Foundation would cease operations by 2045. In an interview with the Financial Times, the billionaire philanthropist addressed Musk's recent cuts to the US Agency for International Development, the agency responsible for distributing foreign aid across the world. He criticised the shuttering of the agency and accused Musk of risking a resurgence of diseases such as measles, HIV and polio.
"The picture of the world's richest man killing the world's poorest children is not a pretty one," Gates told the Financial Times. "I'd love for him to go in and meet the children that have now been infected with HIV because he cut that money," he said of Musk.
Elsewhere in the interview, the 69-year-old announced that he would give up his remaining wealth to his nonprofit foundation over the next two decades.
Separately, in a blog post, the Microsoft founder said that his foundation would be ceasing operations by December 31, 2045.
"People will say a lot of things about me when I die, but I am determined that 'he died rich' will not be one of them," Bill Gates wrote in the blog post. "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," he added.
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Gates said that his foundation has already donated more than $100 billion, and that he expects it will spend another $200 billion over the next two decades. In the blog, he also outlined three main goals for his foundation: eliminating preventable diseases which kill mothers and children; eliminating infectious diseases, including malaria and measles; and eliminating poverty for hundreds of millions of people.
Notably, according to Bloomberg's Billionaires' Index, Gates has a personal fortune of $168 billion, which ranks him as the fifth wealthiest man in the world.
"The Gates Foundation's mission remains rooted in the idea that where you are born should not determine your opportunities," Gates wrote in his blog post. "I am excited to see how our next chapter continues to move the world closer to a future where everyone everywhere has the chance to live a healthy and productive life," he added.
