Editing Gates Foundation (section)

===About the global health division===<!-- There is another section titled "Global health division" -->
A 2007 investigation by the ''[[Los Angeles Times]]''<ref name="LA"/> claimed there are three major unintended consequences with the foundation's allocation of aid towards the fight against AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria. First, sub-Saharan Africa already suffered from a shortage of primary doctors before the arrival of the Gates Foundation, but "by pouring most contributions into the fight against such high-profile killers as AIDS, Gates grantees have increased the demand for specially trained, higher-paid clinicians, diverting staff from basic care" in sub-Saharan Africa. This "brain drain" adds to the existing doctor shortage and pulls away additional trained staff from children and those suffering from other common killers. Second, "the focus on a few diseases has shortchanged basic needs such as nutrition and transportation".<ref name="LA" /> Third, "Gates-funded vaccination programs have instructed caregivers to ignore – even discourage patients from discussing – ailments that the vaccinations cannot prevent".<ref name="LA" />

In response, the Gates Foundation has said that African governments need to spend more of their budgets on public health than on wars, that the foundation has donated at least $70 million to help improve nutrition and [[agriculture]] in Africa, in addition to its disease-related initiatives and that it is studying ways to improve the delivery of health care in Africa.<ref name="LA"/>

Both insiders and external critics have suggested that there is too much deference to Bill Gates's personal views within the Gates Foundation, insufficient internal debate, and pervasive "group think".<ref name="ReferenceB"/><ref name="theguardian.com">{{cite news |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/jul/12/bill-and-melinda-gates-foundation |title=Inside the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation |work=[[The Guardian]] |date=July 12, 2010 |first=Andy |last=Beckett |access-date=December 11, 2016 |archive-date=July 26, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240726174513/https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/jul/12/bill-and-melinda-gates-foundation |url-status=live }}</ref> Critics also complain that Gates Foundation grants are often awarded based on social connections and ideological allegiances rather than based on formal external review processes or technical competence.<ref name="theguardian.com"/>

Critics{{WHO|date=January 2024}} have suggested that Gates' approach to Global Health and Agriculture favors the interests of large pharmaceutical and agribusiness companies over the interests of the people of developing countries.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.ghwatch.org/sites/www.ghwatch.org/files/d1.3.pdf |title=The Gates Foundation |website=Global Health Watch |access-date=January 22, 2019 |archive-date=January 22, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220122133756/https://www.ghwatch.org/sites/www.ghwatch.org/files/d1.3.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://newint.org/features/2012/04/01/bill-gates-charitable-giving-ethics/ |title=The flip side to Bill Gates' charity billions – New Internationalist |first=Andrew |last=Bowman |date=April 2012 |access-date=October 18, 2014 |archive-date=October 21, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141021000541/http://newint.org/features/2012/04/01/bill-gates-charitable-giving-ethics/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://faculty.maxwell.syr.edu/cbertini/Media/Kristi_Heim.pdf |title=Professor Catherine Bertini |access-date=December 17, 2016 |archive-date=October 19, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141019014642/http://faculty.maxwell.syr.edu/cbertini/Media/Kristi_Heim.pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.humanosphere.org/social-business/2014/10/critics-say-gates-foundations-agriculture-program-wont-help-poor-farmers/ |title=Critics say Gates Foundation's agriculture program won't help poor farmers |work=Humanosphere |date=October 13, 2014 |access-date=October 18, 2014 |archive-date=April 4, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160404153313/http://www.humanosphere.org/social-business/2014/10/critics-say-gates-foundations-agriculture-program-wont-help-poor-farmers/ |url-status=dead }}</ref> After the Gates foundation urged the [[University of Oxford]] to find a large company partner to get [[Oxford–AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine|its COVID-19 vaccine]] to market, the university backed off from its earlier pledge to donate the rights to any drugmaker.<ref>{{cite web |title=They Pledged to Donate Rights to Their COVID Vaccine, Then Sold Them to Pharma |url=https://khn.org/news/rather-than-give-away-its-covid-vaccine-oxford-makes-a-deal-with-drugmaker/ |website=Kaiser Health News |date=August 25, 2020 |access-date=January 28, 2021 |archive-date=February 7, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210207230036/https://khn.org/news/rather-than-give-away-its-covid-vaccine-oxford-makes-a-deal-with-drugmaker/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

Critics have outlined that the "Global Health Governance" approach as its conducted by the BMGF can best be understood as "Global Health [[Imperialism]]" breaking with the "traditional notions of [[Westphalian sovereignty]]" by enforcing capitalist policies on all countries.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Levich|first=Jacob|date=2015|title=The Gates Foundation, Ebola, and Global Health Imperialism|journal=The American Journal of Economics and Sociology|volume=74|issue=4|pages=704–742|doi=10.1111/ajes.12110|jstor=43817537 |doi-access=free}}</ref> Also the broader concept of "[[philanthrocapitalism]]" is criticised as not addressing the real issue of systemic inequality of capitalism. Instead of real social change organisations such as BMGF represent the interests of "highly sophisticated capitalists who know what they want and how best to get it" – the "Global Health Imperialism" agenda is devoted "to expanding worldwide markets and facilitating commerce on behalf of Western capitalism".<ref>{{cite book |doi=10.4324/9781315297255-20 |chapter=Disrupting global health |title=Routledge Handbook on the Politics of Global Health |date=2018 |last1=Levich |first1=Jacob |pages=207–218 |isbn=978-1-315-29725-5 }}</ref>

Some experts have pointed that, while it is true that the foundation exercises inordinate power on the WHO, that is possible because the WHO is chronically underfunded and has prestige problems.
Some rich countries have narrower views on global health and engage in [[vaccine nationalism]]. 
The foundation is criticized for not battling monopolies on intellectual property, crowding out different views on policy and favoring [[solutionism]].
Its focus on concrete illnesses leads away of system changes.<ref name="Ferrer">{{cite news |last1=Ferrer |first1=Sergio |title=Filantropía, salud y poder económico: ¿El problema es la Fundación Gates o va mucho más allá? |url=https://www.eldiario.es/sociedad/filantropia-salud-economico-problema-fundacion-gates_1_10878671.html |access-date=31 January 2024 |work=elDiario.es |date=30 January 2024 |language=es-ES |archive-date=January 31, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240131100308/https://www.eldiario.es/sociedad/filantropia-salud-economico-problema-fundacion-gates_1_10878671.html |url-status=live }}</ref>