‘Pandemic has exposed the cracks in our societies’

Melinda Gates, co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, recently launched three innovations around emerging technologies and spoke to about innovation and how the coronavirus pandemic will change the world. Edited excerpts:

Four women have won the Nobel Prize this year, three for their work in physics and chemistry. Do you think women’s leadership in science is finally getting global recognition?

I sure hope so, and I think the reason that’s so important is little girls can only be what they can see. And so, when they see women winning Nobel Prizes in the sciences, they say, ‘wow, I also can be a scientist. I aspire to do cutting-edge research. I can get there.’ And so, I sure hope it’s a moniker and a marker in time of, wow, we really are turning the corner on women in the sciences.

How else can science be made more exciting for girls so they choose careers in research, engineering and technology?

We know that young girls and women are much more interested in the sciences if they’re working on a real problem that they see out in society. If they see something that they know will benefit their community or benefit their family or it’s a real-world example instead of just a theoretical example, they’re much more likely to persist in the sciences.

So, they like to address real-world problems?

Exactly. They like to address real-world problems.

How can countries reopen their economies without risking the population’s health?

I think that’s a great question to ask the women’s selfhelp groups in India. As you know, there are millions of women in self-help groups in India who are out in the villages. They’re the ones who know, okay, how can people get a different life and livelihood here? What are the opportunities? Are there opportunities if they have access to digital? Are there different kinds of opportunities in terms of what they actually decide to grow on their small plot of land? Quite often, if they can get into a different type of agriculture, something that is more drought- resistant or pest-resistant or is more desired by people; sometimes switching their crops so that they’re meeting market needs a potential opportunity, or getting into poultry or livestock.

Can Covid-19 end without a vaccine?

We need a vaccine

Has Covid-19 changed life as we know it forever?

I do think life as we knew it has changed, will change forever, but sometimes out of a crisis comes something beautiful. I look back at some of the wars and you think about what was rebuilt after the war to maintain peace and stability around the globe. Look at the World Health Organization that was formed to make sure that we have information about health and share that around the globe. I think we will have to build new institutions. We’ll have to do more to protect everybody and the vulnerable.

There are signs that people want something different. They already wanted something different before the pandemic. And I think the pandemic has exposed the cracks in all of our societies, the gaps and the people we don’t take care of, and now it’s in our face. Women’s unpaid work, no one can turn away from that. It’s in our home every single day, women taking care of the children or taking care of the elderly during the pandemic. I think there are ways that we will be able to build back and build back in a better way.

What differentiates the Grand Challenges from other initiatives to boost innovation?

Grand Challenges was set up to bring some innovative ideas forward in global health and global development. Other awards are quite often focused on other problems. We’re quite intent as well on making sure that it is a diverse set of voices bringing the ideas forward from many of the countries that aren’t high-income countries, and there are female scientists bringing ideas forward.

There are ways that we will be able to build back and build back in a better way

MELINDA GATES

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