Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates said Tuesday he has tested positive for COVID-19 and is experiencing mild symptoms. Via Twitter, the billionaire philanthropist said he will isolate until he is again healthy. “I’m fortunate to be vaccinated and boosted and have access to testing and great medical care,” Gates wrote. Read: Biden sees bigger role for US farms due to Ukraine war The Seattle-based Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is the most influential private foundation in the world, with an endowment of about $65 billion. Bill Gates has been a vocal proponent for pandemic mitigation measures, specifically access to vaccines and medication for poorer countries. The Gates Foundation in October said it will spend $120 million to boost access to generic versions of drugmaker Merck’s antiviral COVID-19 pill for lower-income countries.

Three days before Elon Musk agreed to buy Twitter, the world’s richest man tweeted a photo of Bill Gates and used a crude sexual term to make fun of his belly. Playful, aggressive and often juvenile, Musk’s past tweets show how he has used social media to craft his public image as a brash billionaire unafraid to offend. They may also reveal clues as to how Musk will govern the platform he hopes to own. “Look at the feed: It’s all over the place. It’s erratic. At times it’s pretty extreme,” said Jennifer Grygiel, a Syracuse University professor who studies social media and who recently assigned Musk’s tweets as reading material for their students. “It paints him as some sort of rebel leader who will take control of the public square to save it. That is a myth he has constructed.” Musk joined Twitter in 2010 and now has more than 85 million followers — the seventh most of any account and the highest for any business leader. He had mused about buying the site before he agreed on Monday to pay $44 billion for Twitter, which he said he hopes to turn into a haven where all speech is allowed. Also read: Elon Musk buys Twitter for $44B and will privatize company “I hope that even my worst critics remain on Twitter, because that is what free speech means,” Musk wrote in a tweet. As the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, Musk uses his Twitter account to make business announcements and promote his enterprises. He muses about technology and trade, but has also posted jokes about women’s breasts and once compared Canada’s prime minister to Hitler. He regularly weighs in on global events, as he did in March 2020 when he tweeted that “The coronavirus pandemic is dumb.” He’s also used the account to punch back at critics, such as when he called a diver working to rescue boys trapped in a cave in Thailand a “pedo,” short for pedophile. The diver had previously criticized Musk’s proposal to use a sub to rescue the boys. Musk, who won a defamation suit filed by the diver, later said he never intended “pedo” to be interpreted as “pedophile.” A few years ago, after software engineer Cher Scarlett criticized Musk’s handling of the cave incident, the tech billionaire fired back and she was soon being harassed by dozens of Musk’s online fans. He later deleted the posts, but not before Scarlett had to lock down her account because she was receiving so many hateful messages. “It’s ironic to me that somebody who claims they want to buy Twitter to protect free speech has such thin skin,” she said. “He’s a very smart man, and when he replies to people that criticize him, he knows what he’s doing. To me that’s not championing free speech, it’s weaponizing free speech, and I think that’s what he’ll do owning this platform.” Also read: Elon Musk wants to buy Twitter, make it 'maximally trusted' Nineteen-year-old Jack Sweeney got Musk’s attention when he created an automated Twitter account that tracked the movements of Musk’s jet. Musk responded by offering Sweeney $5,000 to pull the account. When Sweeney refused, Musk blocked him on Twitter. Sweeney said he’s worried he may get kicked off the site entirely if Musk’s takeover is approved. But he said he likes Musk’s free speech absolutism, and hopes he sees it through. “He’ll make it more open, and I think that’s a good thing,” Sweeney said. Musk’s use of Twitter has also led to problems for his own companies. In one August 2018 tweet, for instance, Musk asserted that he had the funding to take Tesla private for $420 a share, although a court has ruled that it wasn’t true. That led to an SEC investigation that Musk is still fighting. More recently, Musk appeared to have violated SEC rules that required him to disclose that he’d acquired a 5% stake in Twitter; instead he waited until he had more than 9%. Experts say these issues aren’t likely to affect his Twitter acquisition. Last year another federal agency, the National Labor Relations Board, ordered Musk to delete a tweet that officials said illegally threatened to cut stock options for Tesla employees who joined the United Auto Workers union. Those tweets helped cement Musk’s reputation as a brash outsider, a workingman’s billionaire, Grygiel said. But that doesn’t mean he is equipped to run a social media platform with more than 200 million users, the professor added. “Maybe he wants to burn it down,” Grygiel said. “I don’t know. But I do know that it shows that no one person should have this kind of power.”

Three days before Elon Musk agreed to buy Twitter, the world’s richest man tweeted a photo of Bill Gates and used a crude sexual term to make fun of his belly. Playful, aggressive and often juvenile, Musk’s past tweets show how he has used social media to craft his public image as a brash billionaire unafraid to offend. They may also reveal clues as to how Musk will govern the platform he hopes to own. “Look at the feed: It’s all over the place. It’s erratic. At times it’s pretty extreme,” said Jennifer Grygiel, a Syracuse University professor who studies social media and who recently assigned Musk’s tweets as reading material for their students. “It paints him as some sort of rebel leader who will take control of the public square to save it. That is a myth he has constructed.” Musk joined Twitter in 2010 and now has more than 85 million followers — the seventh most of any account and the highest for any business leader. He had mused about buying the site before he agreed on Monday to pay $44 billion for Twitter, which he said he hopes to turn into a haven where all speech is allowed. “I hope that even my worst critics remain on Twitter, because that is what free speech means,” Musk wrote in a tweet. As the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, Musk uses his Twitter account to make business announcements and promote his enterprises. He muses about technology and trade, but has also posted jokes about women’s breasts and once compared Canada’s prime minister to Hitler. He regularly weighs in on global events, as he did in March 2020 when he tweeted that “The coronavirus pandemic is dumb.” He’s also used the account to punch back at critics, such as when he called a diver working to rescue boys trapped in a cave in Thailand a “pedo,” short for pedophile. The diver had previously criticized Musk’s proposal to use a sub to rescue the boys. Musk, who won a defamation suit filed by the diver, later said he never intended “pedo” to be interpreted as “pedophile.” Also Read: Twitter bans ads that contradict science on climate change A few years ago, after software engineer Cher Scarlett criticized Musk’s handling of the cave incident, the tech billionaire fired back and she was soon being harassed by dozens of Musk’s online fans. He later deleted the posts, but not before Scarlett had to lock down her account because she was receiving so many hateful messages. “It’s ironic to me that somebody who claims they want to buy Twitter to protect free speech has such thin skin,” she said. “He’s a very smart man, and when he replies to people that criticize him, he knows what he’s doing. To me that’s not championing free speech, it’s weaponizing free speech, and I think that’s what he’ll do owning this platform.” Nineteen-year-old Jack Sweeney got Musk’s attention when he created an automated Twitter account that tracked the movements of Musk’s jet. Musk responded by offering Sweeney $5,000 to pull the account. When Sweeney refused, Musk blocked him on Twitter. Also Read: Shareholders await Musk's next move in Twitter takeover bid Sweeney said he’s worried he may get kicked off the site entirely if Musk’s takeover is approved. But he said he likes Musk’s free speech absolutism, and hopes he sees it through. “He’ll make it more open, and I think that’s a good thing,” Sweeney said. Musk’s use of Twitter has also led to problems for his own companies. In one August 2018 tweet, for instance, Musk asserted that he had the funding to take Tesla private for $420 a share, although a court has ruled that it wasn’t true. That led to an SEC investigation that Musk is still fighting. More recently, Musk appeared to have violated SEC rules that required him to disclose that he’d acquired a 5% stake in Twitter; instead he waited until he had more than 9%. Experts say these issues aren’t likely to affect his Twitter acquisition. Last year another federal agency, the National Labor Relations Board, ordered Musk to delete a tweet that officials said illegally threatened to cut stock options for Tesla employees who joined the United Auto Workers union. Those tweets helped cement Musk’s reputation as a brash outsider, a workingman’s billionaire, Grygiel said. But that doesn’t mean he is equipped to run a social media platform with more than 200 million users, the professor added. “Maybe he wants to burn it down,” Grygiel said. “I don’t know. But I do know that it shows that no one person should have this kind of power.”      

Bangladeshi scientist Dr Firdausi Qadri has been conferred with the prestigious Ramon Magsaysay Award for 2021, in recognition of her groundbreaking work in “developing vaccines that have saved millions of lives”.   The Ramon Magsaysay Award Foundation’s board of trustees cited “her passion and life-long devotion to the scientific profession; her vision of building the human and physical infrastructure that will benefit the coming generation of Bangladeshi scientists, women scientists in particular, and her untiring contributions to vaccine development, advanced biotechnological therapeutics and critical research that has been saving millions of precious lives.” Read: Dr Firdausi Qadri: Ramon Magsaysay 2021 Award Winner Bangladeshi Scientist It caps a year in Dr Qadri’s life that saw her life’s work finally receiving the recognition it merits, within the general atmosphere in which scientists – particularly those in the field of life sciences – are being more valued for the invaluable work they do since the onset of the global pandemic.   Dr Qadri has focused her research on enteric diseases, specifically in the areas of immunology, genomics, proteomic technology and diagnostics, and vaccine development. Perhaps her most important intervention will remain the introduction of a new cheap oral cholera vaccine in Bangladesh, as an alternative to Dukoral, which is costly for poor people and cost-ineffective as a public health tool.   In October 2020, Bill Gates described her as a hero for her work in developing the new cheap cholera vaccine, which was done in partnership with the Gates Foundation: “In 2011, Dr. Qadri and her team at the International Centre for Diarrheal Disease and Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b) led a feasibility study on a newer, more affordable oral cholera vaccine, Shanchol. The study, which was done in partnership with our foundation, showed that the inexpensive vaccine could be an effective tool in stopping the spread of cholera in poor, urban environments, giving people more than 50 percent protection against the disease,” Gates wrote. He went on to write that it helped lead to “a complete change in thinking about how the world could tackle the challenge of cholera.”   “You can have very good water, sanitation, education, good homes and people won’t have cholera. But until that happens, you need to stop the misery. You need to control the disease,” Dr. Qadri was quoted as saying in the piece by Gates, which appeared on his Gates Notes blog. “And the vaccine is a one-stop solution.” Read:Dr Qadri wins Magsaysay Award for developing life-saving vaccines In 2012, Qadri was awarded the Fondation Christophe et Rodolphe Mérieux's annual scientific 'Grand Prize', called the "Christophe Mérieux Prize", for her research on infectious enteric diseases In 2013, the World Health Organization (WHO) helped to create an oral cholera vaccine stockpile, to contain and prevent outbreaks. Since then, more than 60 million doses have been shipped worldwide. Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, is supporting countries to use the cholera vaccine to target cholera “hotspots”—areas at highest risk—to prevent outbreaks before they happen, according to Gates.   The UN has previously noted not only Dr Qadri’s own work, but also how a large part of her career has been focused on developing leaders in the field of infectious disease research from different disciplines and institutions. She has inspired many young scientists through her teaching and research activities.   “Her penchant for mentoring can be seen in her lab and field sites where aspiring fellows from both local and international universities, join her team as interns and later move on to faculty positions globally,” the organisation’s High Representative for the Least Developed Countries, Landlocked Developing Countries and the Small Island Developing States (UN-OHRLLS) wrote in a profile of her.   The arrival in 2017 of nearly one million Rohingya refugees from Myanmar into overcrowded camps in Bangladesh raised serious concerns about a cholera epidemic. Working with the government, Dr. Qadri led a vaccination program that has helped prevent an outbreak, through a program that vaccinated 700,000 of the distressed refugees.   “If this vaccination was not carried out, there would be chaotic conditions,” Dr. Qadri said of the campaign. “We were able to prevent a major, major epidemic and deaths.” She was also awarded the L'Oréal-UNESCO Award 2020 for her “outstanding work in science to prevent infectious diseases affecting children in developing countries and for promoting early diagnosis and vaccination with global health impact”. Read:BINA and scientist Dr Shamsun Nahar receive prestigious IAEA awards And earlier this year, Dr Qadri was one of three Bangladeshis – all women – who were named by Asian Scientist magazine in their list of the “best and brightest 100 Asian scientists.” The Magsaysay is by far the most prestigious of the awards she has received, but it is only fitting for someone whose work is making it possible to believe in a world where the “world’s longest-running pandemic,” caused by cholera, can be defeated.    

India's very own Jamsetji Tata, the founder of the iconic salt-to-software conglomerate Tata Group, has topped the list of the world's most generous individuals of the last century. With donations worth $102.4 billion in his lifetime, Tata pipped Microsoft founder Bill Gates and American business magnate Warren Buffet to emerge as the globe's biggest givers of the last century in the list of the world's top-50 philanthropists prepared by leading research platform Hurun Report and grant-making organisation EdelGive Foundation. Read The World's 10 Self-made Youngest Billionaires in 2021 Gates and his now-estranged wife Melinda have donated $74.6 billion, Buffet $37.4 billion, legendary hedge fund manager George Soros $34.8 billion and American financier John D Rockefeller $26.8 billion in the last century, as per the list. “Whilst American and European philanthropists may have dominated the thinking of philanthropy over the last century, Jamsetji Tata, founder of India's Tata Group, is the world's biggest philanthropist," Rupert Hoogewerf, the chairman and chief researcher at Hurun, said in a statement. Widely regarded as the 'Father of the Indian Industry', Tata's ambitious endeavours and vision not only shaped the exceptional business conglomerate but also helped India earn her place in the league of industrialised nations. He had made his fortune trading cotton, tea, copper, brass and even opium. Read BGMEA donates Tk5 crore to PM's fund for Covid-hit poor families "Setting aside two-thirds of ownership to trusts engaged in doing good in various areas, including education and healthcare, has helped Tatas achieve the top spot in giving," said  Hoogewerf, adding that Tata's giving started in 1892 itself. Tata, who was born in 1839 into a Parsi family in a city in the western state of Gujarat (then part of British India), started his early career as a merchant, but he went on to change the business landscape of the country through his many ventures -- Tata Steel company being the notable among them. A globe-trekker, Tata was always fascinated by new inventions. Read Bangladesh to get $ 940 mln ADB loans for procuring Covid vaccine  

Bill Gates’ ex-girlfriend Ann Winblad allowed him to propose to Melinda French. Following the break up of Bill and Ann in 1987, Bill married Melinda in 1994. Then after 27 years’ time span, Mr. and Mrs. Gates finally ended their marriage on May 03, 2021. They already began to split their $130 billion fortune among themselves. However, their divorce won’t affect their charitable foundation. Even they will continue their work together. Despite all of the facts, this high-profile separation has raised many buzzes. After all, a life-turning decision of the overachievers is quite enough to make history. Let’s unfold the background of this incident. Who is Bill Gates’ Ex-Girlfriend Ann Winblad is a software entrepreneur and a co-founder of a venture capital software firm. She was also a tech consultant from IBM and Microsoft. Even she invested in Microsoft as well. In 1984, she got introduced to Bill Gates at Ben Rosen-Esther Dyson computer conference. Later they dated even though she was five years older than Bill. Due to this age gap, they broke up in 1987. But it hadn’t any impact on their friendship. However, Ann started a family with Alex Kline, a San Francisco private investigator. Subsequently, her venture capital firm successfully launched 16 startups. In 2000, Fortune magazine added her to the small business Hall of Fame. The Chemistry between Bill and Ann Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and Melinda French had a mutual agreement during their wedding. Every year he will spend a long weekend with Ann. Ann Winblad has a beach cottage on the outer banks of North Carolina. She rode dune buggies, hung-glide, and walked on the beach with Bill. They shared their thoughts about the world and themselves. They wonder about how they were on a quest on the fringes of a little-known industry and ended up at the center of the universe. Prior to the marriage with Melinda, Bill used to go to Brazil with Ann for a vacation, where they studied bioengineering together. They used to go to the beach on each trip for bonfires and games. And, most importantly, they used to go there with other couples for a tradition named the sing-down. Each couple would take a word and sing with it. So after the marriage, Bill and Ann made a deal with Melinda to take an annual vacation to continue the tradition. Whether it is a justification of the agreement or not, Bill Gates’ ex-girlfriend Ann had undeniable platonic love for him. When Bill couldn’t make up his mind for marrying Melinda, he came to Ann for approval. She told him to go for it by stating Melinda is good for him as she has intellectual stamina. The relationship between Mr. and Mrs. Gates Bill and Melinda have an amazing relationship even before their conjugal life. Melinda joined Microsoft as a product manager. Then during a trade convention in New York, they met each other at a dinner party. It didn’t take much time for them to get a realization about their marriage. They both have a great sense of humor even in serious situations. Bill once listed out his advantages and shortcomings of marriage on a whiteboard. Bill actually wanted to get married but he doesn’t know its essence along with running Microsoft. Also Read: Bill and Melinda Gates announce they are getting divorced It was really surprising for them to express love to each other. Subsequently, Bill concludes by saying that they have to care a lot for each other and there were only two chances: either, breaking up or getting married. That’s all this happy couple shared with Netflix’s docuseries in 2019. Throughout more than two and a half-decade marital life, they got three children: Jennifer, Rory, and Phoebe. On Monday, May 03, 2021, the couple twitted their decision for the divorce. All they said is that they continue to share a belief in a mission. But they no longer believe they can grow together as a couple in this next stage of their lives. The Climax in the Conjugal Love Though Melinda decided to stay at home while Bill remained CEO of Microsoft, that they ensure an equal partnership. Melinda said that it just doesn’t make any sense. One can’t be the CEO and take all the hurdles. Somebody needs to be at home due to teach the children about social values. Otherwise, the children may be raised by somebody else. It was absolutely an equal partnership. It’s necessary to make the world understand that we are leading this place together. The main focus is the joint values played out in the world. The partnership even included dividing some household chores. That’s all the Gates couple shared with CBS' Sunday Morning in 2017. Ann and Melinda talking about Bill Gates Not as Bill Gates’ ex-girlfriend, she spoke for herself in a 2005 interview with the San Francisco Chronicle. Ann told that Gates wasn’t poising her as a big issue when she began to date him. There was a time when her net worth was even higher than Bill’s, and she had to pay for everything. It was a very short time, but it was not something to forget. In a 2019 Instagram video, Melinda was up to express her relationship with Bill. While she came to knew that she was going to meet him at Microsoft, she said she never imagined things would go that way. When she moved to Seattle to join Microsoft, she knew that meeting Bill is inevitable because the company was small. But she couldn’t think at all that she would fall in love with Bill or that they would get married. Even when they were dating early on, she never had a single thought to get married. It was definitely a great surprise for her." Summing up Either Bill Gates’ ex-girlfriend or another overachiever, a billion-dollar love story can turn into both ways. Considering both the $65 billion-dollar worth, and 65 years old age, the fan buzz ultimately points to the 70 years old Ann Winblad. Apart from that, does Bill’s ex-relationship have to do with the divorce? This question is yet to reveal.

Bill and Melinda Gates said Monday that they are divorcing but would keep working together at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, one of the largest charitable foundations in the world. In identical tweets, the Microsoft co-founder and his wife said they had made the decision to end their marriage of 27 years. “We have raised three incredible children and built a foundation that works all over the world to enable all people to lead healthy, productive lives,” they said in a statement. “We ask for space and privacy for our family as we begin to navigate this new life.” Bill Gates was formerly the world’s richest person and his fortune is estimated at well over $100 billion. How the couple end up settling their estate and any impact on the foundation will be closely watched, especially after another high-profile Seattle-area billionaire couple recently ended their marriage. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and MacKenzie Bezos finalized their divorce in 2019. MacKenzie Scott has since remarried and now focuses on her own philanthropy after receiving a 4% stake in Amazon, worth more than $36 billion. The Gateses were married in 1994 in Hawaii. They met after she began working at Microsoft as a product manager in 1987. In her 2019 memoir, “The Moment of Lift,” Melinda Gates wrote about her childhood, life and private struggles as the wife of a public icon and stay-at-home mom with three kids. She won Bill Gates’ heart after meeting at a work dinner, sharing a mutual love of puzzles and beating him at a math game. She also detailed the ways they navigated imbalances in their marriage and parenting journey and noted how working together at the foundation made their relationship better. “Bill and I are equal partners,” Melinda Gates said in a 2019 interview with The Associated Press. “Men and women should be equal at work.” The Seattle-based Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is the most influential private foundation in the world, with an endowment worth nearly $50 billion. It has focused on global health and development and U.S. education issues since incorporating in 2000. While both are global figures, Melinda Gates has increasingly built her profile as a champion of women and girls. The former tech business executive launched her private Pivotal Ventures investment and incubation company in 2015 and recently partnered with Scott for a newly announced equity challenge. David Callahan, founder of the Insider Philanthropy website and author of “The Givers: Wealth, Power, and Philanthropy in a New Gilded Age” says it’s too early to know how the divorce will affect the Gates foundation and the wider philanthropic community. Although the couple say they will continue to work together at their foundation, Callahan suggests Melinda Gates could still pursue her own philanthropic work. “You can imagine two separate tracks where they’re both working together at the foundation, and each is pursuing their own independent philanthropy outside the foundation,” Callahan said. He said the possibility of Melinda Gates opening another philanthropic foundation would have a dramatic impact. “Nobody knows what the terms are of their divorce agreement. But if Melinda Gates ends up with just some portion of that wealth and turns to creating her own foundation, it would be among one of the biggest foundations probably in America,” Callahan said. As the public face of the foundation’s COVID-19 grants and advocacy work, Bill Gates has come under fire for being a staunch supporter of intellectual property rights for vaccine makers. While the tech icon says protecting the shots’ recipes will ensure incentives for research and development, critics claim that mentality hampers supply in favor of drug company profits. Last year, Bill Gates said he was stepping down from Microsoft’s board to focus on philanthropy. He was Microsoft’s CEO until 2000 and since then has gradually scaled back his involvement in the company he started with Paul Allen in 1975. He transitioned out of a day-to-day role in Microsoft in 2008 and served as chairman of the board until 2014.

Bill and Melinda Gates announced Monday that they are divorcing. The Microsoft co-founder and his wife, who launched the world’s largest charitable foundation, said they would continue to work together at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. In identical tweets, they said they had decided to end their marriage of 27 years. “We have raised three incredible children and built a foundation that works all over the world to enable all people to lead healthy, productive lives,” they said in a statement. “We ask for space and privacy for our family as we begin to navigate this new life.” In her 2019 memoir, “The Moment of Lift,” Melinda Gates wrote about her childhood, life and private struggles as the wife of a public icon and stay-at-home mom with three kids. She won Gates’ heart after meeting at a work dinner, sharing a mutual love of puzzles and beating him at a math game. The couple’s sprawling Seattle-based foundation is easily the most influential private foundation in the world, with an endowment worth nearly $50 billion. It has focused on global health and development and U.S. education issues since incorporating in 2000. The couple were married in 1994 in Hawaii. They met after she began working at Microsoft as a product manager in 1987. Last year, Bill Gates, formerly the world’s richest person, said he was stepping down from Microsoft’s board to focus on philanthropy. Gates was Microsoft’s CEO until 2000 and since then has gradually scaled back his involvement in the company he started with Paul Allen in 1975. He transitioned out of a day-to-day role in Microsoft in 2008 and served as chairman of the board until 2014. The Gateses will be the second high-profile Seattle-area billionaire couple to end their marriage in recent years. Also read: Bill Gates says he is stepping down from Microsoft board Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and MacKenzie Bezos finalized their divorce in 2019. MacKenzie Scott has since remarried and now focuses on her philanthropy. She received a 4% stake in Amazon, worth more than $36 billion.

From speculation that the coronavirus was created in a lab to hoax cures, an overwhelming amount of false information clung to COVID-19 as it circled the globe in 2020.

European governments and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation pledged Thursday to provide hundreds of millions of dollars in emergency funds for a global effort aimed at ensuring eventual vaccines against the coronavirus are quickly available to poor countries — though it remains unclear how that might actually happen.