Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates and his wife are to give US$220 million (S$280 million) over five years to the non-profit biotech firm Aeras to develop vaccines to fight tuberculosis, a company statement said Thursday.
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is donating the money to Aeras which from its bases in the United States and South Africa has developed six possible TB vaccines that are being tested across Africa, Asia, Europe and America.
A total of 8.8 million people globally fell ill with the contagious lung disease in 2010 and around 1.4 million died, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
The WHO estimates the global economic burden of TB is US$12 billion (S$15 billion) a year, with India and China together accounting for more than half that cost.
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