Months after New York reported its first vaccine-derived polio case in nearly ten years, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation announced Sunday that it will donate $1.2 billion to help eradicate wild polio in the two remaining countries—Pakistan and Afghanistan—where the virus is endemic and preventing future strains of the virus from emerging.
The funds will support the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI), a collaboration between the World Health Organization, the Gates Foundation, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that aims to stop the spread of polio.
According to the Gates Foundation, the organization is aiming to raise $4.8 billion in total for its 2022–2026 program and will raise more donations at a summit on October 18.
