Bill Gates Believes 50% Chance New Pandemic Will Occur In Next 20 Years

MADRID (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 29th May, 2022) microsoft co-founder and billionaire businessman Bill Gates thinks that there is a 50% chance that a new pandemic will break out in the next 20 years, and its origins are likely to be natural.

"The human population is growing and we are invading more and more ecosystems. That is why I estimate that there is a 50% chance that we will have a pandemic of natural origin in the next 20 years as a result of climate change," Gates told the Spanish newspaper elDiario in an interview out on Saturday.

Gates, who recently published a book "How to Prevent the Next Pandemic," explained that the next pandemic could be a flu, a new type of coronavirus and even be a human-made virus, something that he dubbed a "very scary scenario.

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In April, the World Health Organization reported that the number of COVID-19 cases confirmed worldwide surpassed 500 million.

Gates has been an active participant in the global effort to distribute COVID-19 diagnostics, therapeutics and vaccines through his Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and in working with the UN-chaired Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator and the COVAX facility.