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The answer to this question is: a great deal, but...
The massive boost to global health funding that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has given since its inception in 1994 is astonishing. The Foundation's current expenditure of around US$3 billion annually has challenged the world to think big and to be more ambitious about what can be done to save lives in low-income settings. The Gates Foundation has added renewed dynamism, credibility, and attractiveness to global health. In particular, the Foundation inaugurated an im portant new era of scientific commitment to global health predicaments. For example, other more well-established funding organ isations-such as the US National Institutes of Health-now take their international health responsi bil ities far more seriously thanks to the Foundation's ener getic advocacy. Perhaps even more important is the fresh and deep political commitment to health that the Foundation has fostered.
There are several big successes the Foundation can take credit for. The Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation, which received an initial gift from the Foun dation of $750 million in 1999, has been its single most important contribution to global health so far. To that we would add the Foundation's investment in the Seattlebased...