
Bill Gates Has Regrets - benryon
https://www.wsj.com/articles/bill-gates-coronavirus-vaccine-covid-19-11589207803
======
bransonf
Personally, I’m a huge fan of the Gates foundation and their public health
efforts. However, I recognize that not everyone shares this sentiment.

The anti-vax crowd had painted Gates as the devil, and a non-insignificant
number of people just don’t like him because he’s wealthy. In these ways, I
don’t think there was anything more he really could have done. The reason that
Covid has hit the United States so hard is because of a blatant culture of
denial. As a country, we deny the news, we deny science. Had Gates tried to
speak up more, it would have been met with denialism.

~~~
sildur
A lot of people don’t like him not because he’s wealthy, but because the ways
he used to become wealthy.

~~~
pizzapill
As much as I like most of what he does nowadays I always wonder how many years
of technological progress we lost due to Microsofts shenanigans.

~~~
junaru
We are loosing more due to Google every year than we ever did with Microsoft.

~~~
grizzles
Why do you think so? Their business model? Google are vicious competitors for
sure but they open source a ton of cutting edge stuff like jax & tensorflow. I
would say they've did a great job at advancing the state of science &
technology in the world.

~~~
72deluxe
I always wonder about Google. I know they produce Android but if they
disappeared overnight, the world would carry on working, e.g everyone would
switch to using another search engine. There would be less tracking (thanks
Google Analytics)!

If Microsoft disappeared overnight, how many businesses (not tech businesses
but real businesses, like warehouses etc. not running Macs) would need a
functioning version of Windows or Win32 software to get by?? I think Microsoft
has a larger effect on the world than Google by a very very large stretch.

Even in development, Microsoft's products are used far more widely. How many
Google development tools are people using? I've got Android Studio but my
daily dev work is Visual Studio on Windows and VS Code on Mac.

------
kauffj
Privacy and user-friendly archive link:
[http://archive.is/KdcDA](http://archive.is/KdcDA)

~~~
junaru
Archive.is is not privacy friendly:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19828317](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19828317)

------
jfengel
Given how much denial there is of the threat now that it is a fait accompli,
it's hard to imagine convincing a sufficient number to deal with it as an
abstraction.

~~~
champagneben
It might be harder for some to accept it now, given that it might hurt their
preferred political outcome.

------
code4tee
Sadly there are few in leadership positions willing to step up and do
something today to help with a long term problem that’s not obviously going to
matter in the very short term.

Climate change and crumbling infrastructure are other examples of this. It’s
easy to just ignore it until later... until later is today. CEO focus on the
next quarter over longer term impacts is another common issue with this “short
term gain for long term pain” mindset.

Real leaders know how to take the flak today to tackle the hard problems of
tomorrow. Sadly such leaders are rare.

A true global pandemic was never a question of if, just when. The world had
several clear warning shots across the bow (SARS, Ebola, ...)

Maybe we need to give anyone seeking a leadership role the “marshmallow test”
(look it up)

~~~
bluGill
Real leaders also know how to conserve political capital. "Great programs"
spend it often before accomplishing the goal.

------
legitster
A bit of a bait-y headline.

I think the crazy thing is that we are _worse_ prepared than if the virus
broke out 5 or 6 years ago. If you think of the millions of dollars the Gates
Foundation spent on lobbying government to be more prepared, it actively had a
negative return rate.

~~~
MattGaiser
> I think the crazy thing is that we are worse prepared than if the virus
> broke out 5 or 6 years ago.

And you think this because???

~~~
orwin
Its true? It's not just the US, France was less prepared than in 2018, and in
2018 was less prepared than in 2011.

After 2005 almost every rich country was stocking on essential medical
equipemnt (like masks), had backup supplylines for medical drugs and had
procedure in the airport in case of a pandemic (in France notably airport
checkups and quarantine + antivirals). Those procedures alone in France were
enough to limit the 2009 flu strain to 300 death (although the following years
mortality data analysis seems to indicate 2 thousand early deaths)

I'm not putting this on any administration, this is a global trend in western
countries.

------
fossuser
I don't see how he could have done more than he did.

I think the problems are bigger, a mixture of incentive problems, and the
political nonsense that comes from that as a result. Along with a newly
digitally connected public that is largely uneducated, easily manipulated, and
bad at critical thinking. Disinformation attacks are more effective than they
used to be.

~~~
vezycash
>largely uneducated

I don't think schooling is the issue. Both schooled and unschooled are falling
for lies - especially when the reader is not knowledgeable in the topic.

>easily manipulated, and bad at critical thinking

I agree here and would add, once people have made up their mind on a topic,
they tend to stick to that position and tune out counter evidence. And their
initial position is due to luck or randomness of which position they first get
exposed to.

~~~
fossuser
Yeah - I think that's a fair criticism.

I'd suspect uneducated makes it worse, but that might not even be true (maybe
uneducated people are more willing to change their mind? maybe they're less
effective at rationalizing bullshit?).

Maybe it's less about education and more about intelligence broadly defined or
less about both and more about practicing 'rationality' specifically, but that
ties into critical thinking.

I could see it being either way, or likely some combination of all of it.

------
burntoutfire
For a second, I was hoping it is going to be about his business practices
while running Microsoft...

------
empath75
Reminds me of this scene:

[https://youtu.be/qIp_8RNNX4k?t=85](https://youtu.be/qIp_8RNNX4k?t=85)

------
mcv
He did what he could. The people who should feel terrible are the people who
didn't listen to him.

------
adultSwim
Philanthropy serves many purposes but it certainly paid to wash his image. He
was publicly hated, notoriously ruthless.

------
sabman83
While there are some conspiracy theories that are hard to believe, this piece
raises some important questions : [https://off-guardian.org/2020/05/09/who-
controls-the-british...](https://off-guardian.org/2020/05/09/who-controls-the-
british-government-response-to-covid-19/)

~~~
orwin
In this paper (i continued reading after the carefully cherrypicked graph
because it seems everyone cherrypick those days):

"""Instead of offering proactive and positive suggestions that will enable our
immune systems to combat the disease"""

Yeah, right. You can train your immune system, this is a well known fact in
every pseudo-scientific paper [0] /s

I'm not asking anyone to be an expert, but man this is 1rst year med school. I
mean anybody who took biology lessons in college know about this. My sister
just started a school to become dietitian (not even nutritionist) and learnt
about this. How can people trust someone who write something so uninformed?

[0] [https://www.hunterandbligh.com.au/life-and-style/8-ways-
to-b...](https://www.hunterandbligh.com.au/life-and-style/8-ways-to-boost-
your-immune-system/)

~~~
sabman83
Isn’t the line following that say the same thing? That the lockdown will
suppress the immunity system?

~~~
orwin
Not exactly, as you can be immunodeficient. It is still inaccurate. If
lockdown was proved to prevents you from sleeping well and to cause enough
nutritional deficiencies (don't have the english word, sorry), yes, maybe it
could perturb the endocrine system enough ot "suppress" your immune system.

But i'm fairly sure everybody that was not eating in restaurants every lunch
ate better than usual (still too much sugar but...). And fitbit data in the US
seems to shows that people are sleeping better during the lockdown[0]. This
argument is based on bad logic, bad science, bad everything.

Honestly, i'm not sure if overall, lockdown is better or worst for the health
of everyone. Im sure some people will have a lot of positive effects (me at
least), some people might suffer more negatives effects, and for other it
might balance out.

From the quick search i did with sleep quality and eating habits, it seems
that overall health is better. However i have two addiction doctors in my
family and anecdotal data seems to suggest that for other people, it was
deadly (one of the two was involved in a Covid unit until last week and just
started counting deaths).

[0] [https://www.fastcompany.com/90499017/fitbit-data-shows-
were-...](https://www.fastcompany.com/90499017/fitbit-data-shows-were-
sleeping-better-during-the-covid-19-lockdown)

~~~
sabman83
Thanks for your reply.

But I do think the point of the article isn't about the science but that Gates
Foundation has a huge role to play in what the government needs to do and that
there is a clear conflict of interest when they add Microsoft to be a partner
in the digital identity plan.

------
s5300
Sigh... while journalism does need money - can somebody post non paywalled
text? I'd like to read this.

~~~
perardi
Sigh…how do people expect journalism to happen if nobody pays for it?

[https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/02/14/fast-
facts-...](https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/02/14/fast-facts-about-
the-newspaper-industrys-financial-struggles/)

Unless you want to create a BBC-esque public broadcasting and news-gathering
operation. In which case, you'll still be paying, just via taxes.

(Also, right now the WSJ has a $1 for 2 months option. Which is probably a
pain to cancel, but still.)

~~~
s5300
Pardon me if I'm not doing my due diligence in research...

It's called the Wall Street Journal, correct?

Didn't Wall Street just get... y'know, a few trillion un-traced doll-hairs?
Perhaps... they could fund the journalism.

In all seriousness: In a civil society, what the U.S. claims to be (IIRC,
somebody correct me if I'm mistaken) - Journalism should be funded by
institutions. Perhaps - funded by the government, at a loss - for the sake of
informing the populace. I think, in a functional civil society, that's atleast
somewhat close to how things should work. I believe it may not go hand in hand
with human nature though...

Thanks to all who helped for my first question though.

~~~
esmi
> Journalism should be funded by institutions. Perhaps - funded by the
> government, at a loss - for the sake of informing the populace.

state run media... i think that's been tried before. maybe a couple of times.

~~~
me_me_me
USA used to support local independent media. Every little paper that got
passed certain threshold was funded by state, as they provided essential
service to local community.

But its much easier to control narrative if there are only few outlets. And
now in post-truth world average Joe doesn't read anything but facebook, or
some rage broadcast.

Read Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media, to see
why the funding has stopped.

------
MattGaiser
Don't feel bad Bill. Getting non-technicals to understand risk is near
impossible.

~~~
Diederich
Getting 'technicals' to understand risk is also rather difficult. Perhaps one
difference is that many 'technicals' (whatever group that is) might feel like
they _do_ understand risk, even when they don't.

~~~
erikig
The Dunning–Kruger effect is real even among 'technicals'. I would say more
but I fear I'd be overstepping how much I understood about the whole thing.

------
SupriseAnxiety
I see things like Gates does, because everhthing is just 0123455789 and
ABDCEFGHIJ. In which music took out the HIJ. Bach turned the H into a B flat.

------
product50
This is what leadership looks like. Rather than just saying that I warned the
world and no one listened - and thus it is not my problem, he is actually
reflecting that I could have done a lot more so that the world listened.

I feel this is important to note in current day and age where the world is so
polarized and blame-gaming is the name of the hour.

