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Bill Gates: Coronavirus may be ‘once-in-a-century pathogen we’ve been worried about’
CNBC ^ | 02-28-2020 | Noah Higgins-Dunn

Posted on 02/28/2020 3:01:53 PM PST by NRx

Billionaire and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates said the coronavirus that has killed at least 2,859 people and infected more than 83,700 globally may be the “once-in-a-century pathogen we’ve been worried about.”

“I hope it’s not that bad, but we should assume it will be until we know otherwise,” Gates wrote in an article published Friday in The New England Journal of Medicine.

Gates and his wife, Melinda, founded The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in 2000 to help improve world health and combat extreme poverty. The foundation announced Feb. 5 that it would donate $100 million to help find treatments and expand testing for the virus, particularly for poorer populations.

According to Gates, COVID-19 poses a serious threat to the world because it’s far more deadly and contagious than many other deadly viruses.

“First, it can kill healthy adults in addition to elderly people with existing health problems,” he wrote. “Second, Covid-19 is transmitted quite efficiently. The average infected person spreads the disease to two or three others — an exponential rate of increase.” World health leaders say the disease is spread by people who are mildly ill or don’t show any symptoms at all, making it harder to contain and more contagious than other types of viruses.

The mortality rate is “many times more severe than typical seasonal influenza,” Gates said. The World Health Organization said the mortality rate of COVID-19 can differ, ranging from 0.7% to up to 4%, depending on the quality of the health-care system where it’s treated. Gates said that its current average estimated fatality rate of around 1% places it somewhere between the 1957 Asian flu pandemic (0.6%) that killed 1.1 million people and the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic (2%) that killed 50 million around the world, according to data from the CDC.

(Excerpt) Read more at cnbc.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society
KEYWORDS: alarmism; coronavirus; covid19; gatesfoundation; sarscov2
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1 posted on 02/28/2020 3:01:53 PM PST by NRx
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To: null and void

ping


2 posted on 02/28/2020 3:02:31 PM PST by NRx (A man of honor passes his father's civilization to his son without surrendering it to strangers.)
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To: NRx

An autistic computer geek lies awake at night worrying about pathogens? Yikes!


3 posted on 02/28/2020 3:03:55 PM PST by Gay State Conservative (The Rats Can't Get Over The Fact That They Lost A Rigged Election)
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To: NRx

3.41% mortality rate among those who have been confirmed to have the disease.


4 posted on 02/28/2020 3:04:28 PM PST by MeganC (There is nothing feminine about feminism.)
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To: MeganC

Bill Gates owns stock in the company that has the patent for the cure.


5 posted on 02/28/2020 3:06:03 PM PST by Dacula (Do you know what is really odd? Numbers not divisible by two.)
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To: NRx

Didn’t Gates WANT the world’s population dropped by a billion or two?


6 posted on 02/28/2020 3:06:21 PM PST by a fool in paradise (Everyone knows Hillary was corrupt, lied, destroyed documents, and influenced witnesses. Rat crime.)
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To: NRx

Yet another example of a Uber rich guy who thinks that somehow makes him an expert on everything.


7 posted on 02/28/2020 3:07:26 PM PST by FlipWilson
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To: NRx

Gates is an expert on viruses the way Bloomberg’s an expert on farming. Being a billionaire doesn’t make you all-knowing.


8 posted on 02/28/2020 3:07:50 PM PST by Jagman
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To: NRx

I’m worried more about your Windows operating system getting a deadly virus.

Stay in your lane, Bill.


9 posted on 02/28/2020 3:08:08 PM PST by moovova
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To: All

CNBC Is really on a mission to fuel the panic and hysteria and tank the economy as much as possible. The rats on that network are convinced they finally have something that will hurt Trump. Seems like every two hours they find a new angle.


10 posted on 02/28/2020 3:08:37 PM PST by gibsonguy
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To: MeganC

That number IS SOW UTTERLY FALSE in the US.

Unless you’re living overseas right now, that’s the number that should matter most to you :)

The only thing that’s pandemic on FR these days is spreading fear and having fear :)


11 posted on 02/28/2020 3:08:43 PM PST by dp0622 (Radicals, racists Don't point finger at me I'm a small town white boy Just tryin' to makne ends meet)
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To: NRx

Hey Bill...can we do a selfie at the Georgia guidestones?


12 posted on 02/28/2020 3:10:02 PM PST by PGalt (Past Peak Civilization?)
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To: NRx

“Worried about” or “Hoping for”?


13 posted on 02/28/2020 3:13:50 PM PST by DuncanWaring (The Lord uses the good ones; the bad ones use the Lord.)
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To: NRx

Those who trust in God need not fear life or death. They are always in their Heavenly Father’s care.


14 posted on 02/28/2020 3:15:32 PM PST by txrefugee
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To: NRx

Stick to selling operating systems Bill!


15 posted on 02/28/2020 3:15:36 PM PST by Reily
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To: PGalt

Hey Bill...can we do a selfie at the Georgia guidestones?

I almost went there but decided to go to the Ty Cobb Museum instead. My Faith warned me not to go.


16 posted on 02/28/2020 3:15:39 PM PST by Dacula (Do you know what is really odd? Numbers not divisible by two.)
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To: NRx

He’s suddenly a medical scientist now, or really just a Liberal fear monger hoping to scare everyone some more.

1. I have no doubt the Cov-19 virus is very serious.

2. I have no doubt the current “crisis” from it will pass as well as will the fears about any long term economic damages coming out of it. The world will adjust and overcome, period.

3. Why? The world medical community is better able than in past plagues to respond the Cov-19.


17 posted on 02/28/2020 3:15:59 PM PST by Wuli
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To: NRx; All

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=Bill+GATES+on+world+populstion&t=osx&ia=videos

Listen to the master of the universe.


18 posted on 02/28/2020 3:17:02 PM PST by PGalt (Past Peak Civilization?)
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To: dp0622

That number does not apply to the US but only because we’re just now starting to see domestic cases of the disease.

Ping me back in two weeks and you’ll see the US mortality numbers on par with Italy and China.


19 posted on 02/28/2020 3:18:04 PM PST by MeganC (There is nothing feminine about feminism.)
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To: NRx

may be the “once-in-a-century pathogen we’ve been worried about.”

“...or not.”


20 posted on 02/28/2020 3:18:45 PM PST by VanShuyten ("...that all the donkeys were dead. I know nothing as to the fate of the less valuable animals.")
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