Travels Changed Gates's View on Global Birth Control

[question everything]

SEATTLE—A little more than a year ago, Melinda Gates made a bold and controversial pledge to help women in the developing world get better access to contraception. It was an unexpected declaration from the practicing Catholic and co-chair with husband Bill of a private philanthropy better known for promoting vaccines and working to improve education. She was sharply criticized by Catholic groups that argue that global health and development funds should go to other causes.

In her travels across sub-Saharan and South Asia over more than a decade, Ms. Gates says she had seen the same scene play out over and over. Women she met with to talk about vaccines would ask her how they could get birth control. "They would say to me, 'But what about that shot I used to get?' " she said in an interview at the headquarters of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The women were referring to Depo-Provera, she explained, an injectable contraceptive that they told her they like and walk miles to get—only to find often out of stock.

Now, one year later, Ms. Gates appears well on her way toward her goal. At a summit last summer hosted by the Gates Foundation and the U.K. Department for International Development, donors pledged $2.6 billion—$300 million more than the hosts had hoped to raise—to bring voluntary family planning services to 120 million more women in the world's poorest countries by 2020.

(snip)

Countries such as Senegal and Tanzania are investing money to improve contraceptive education and availability, Ms. Gates said. Senegal's public-health clinics and hospitals were plagued with stock shortages of contraceptives, but now a new system being introduced across the country has improved supply and variety of products.

(snip)

While she differs with the Catholic Church on contraceptive methods, she said she shares its social-justice mission. "I believe they're in the halls of Congress as much as I am fighting for foreign aid on behalf of poor people," she said.

(snip)

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324059704578475272256663926.html

(If you cannot open at the link, copy and paste title onto google)

[Egalitarian Thug]

1. So why doesn't she take just a small percentage of her vast wealth and buy it? n/t

[randome]

2. I'm sure it's not a one-time thing.

Contraception needs to be available forever, not just one year. Just a guess on my part.

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[font color="blue"][center]Stop looking for heroes. BE one.[/center][/font]
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[Egalitarian Thug]

8. It is easy to detect one's level of commitment by what one is willing to do,

rather than what one is anxious to say. She could do it and live to 110 without seeing her last billion.

[MineralMan]

22. Do you understand what the population of this planet is?

What you are suggesting wouldn't cover the cost at all in areas of the world where it is most needed. Instead a global commitment is needed, not a one time donation. And that appears to be what she is working toward. No doubt, she will commit from her own funds. But that's not sufficient. It needs to be a global effort, funded by many, including those nations. One person cannot supply the world's needs for contraception.

Sorry, but you're letting your dislike for Gates color your point of view on this, I think.

[Egalitarian Thug]

24. Yes. Funding for the entire world is not the issue, read the piece.

Additionally, I also understand how much a billion is and how much the mere accumulation of of it generates and they have access to almost a hundred billions. The Gate's could easily fund this, or any of the other good stuff they want, all by themselves if they were willing to deplete their capital reserves, but operating a tax-shelter foundation that pushes business to other for-profit interests is much more... profitable.

[elehhhhna]

3. wow thanks lady gates

[lumberjack_jeff]

4. "Lady Gates" and Sir Bill?

[JDPriestly]

5. Maybe if enough wealthy Catholics speak out and act as Melinda Gates is doing, we

will get a reasonable policy on birth control from the Catholic Church.

The Gates are Catholic. That explains why they back private schools instead of public schools.

Ughh!

One of the problems with charter and private schools is that they divide the kids in communities.

Here in my part of LA, we have a problem with violence. 12 shootings since last June on streets in our area.

This morning there was a peace march to stop this local violence. The public high school in the area was well represented, proudly represented. They are such good kids. Charter schools separate the kids. They aren't unified behind their community school. That is not a good thing. I don't think it is the cause of the violence, but let's try to bring people together and form communities, not separate them and form cliques and private clubs.

But it is wonderful that Melinda Gates is speaking out for contraception. I wish she would also speak out for public, community schools.

[Egalitarian Thug]

9. Neither of them ever saw the inside of a public school except on a tour. n/t

[question everything]

10. You can say the same thing about any of the Kennedys yet they are still revered

by progressives everyplace.

One does not have to be progressive and empathetic by actually experiencing hardship; one can become one by using one's brain and heart. This is what separates us, liberals, from conservatives who look only at themselves until... they do need help from a government agency.

[Egalitarian Thug]

13. I don't revere them or anybody except in cases where someone actually does something significant.

It's hard to compare because of the changing times, but JFK and RFK seemed to be on the right track, but Teddy was frequently a disappointment.

[Ms. Toad]

11. You would be wrong about that.

But carry on.

[Egalitarian Thug]

14. Bill attended The Lakeside School before Harvard, Melinda is the heir to the

First Interstate fortune. Just which one of these trust fund babies ever attended public school, and please be specific?

[Ms. Toad]

15. Bill.

He was 13 when he entered Lakeside School. Prior to that he attended View Ridge Elementary School, which is part of the public school system in Seattle Washington.

And, while Melinda did not attend public schools, prior to high school she attended a Catholic School which was the equivalent of the ones attended by many working class Catholic families (including all of my spouses' families).

[Egalitarian Thug]

16. Well I write corrected then. Although View Ridge is hardly anything like the majority

of public elementary schools, especially in the mid 60s, it is a public school.

Your claim that the nameless school Melinda attended is equivalent to your neighborhood Catholic school is unlikely. The parasite class doesn't live in this world they made, they wouldn't like it any more than the rest of us do.

[Ms. Toad]

17. The school is not nameless.

You can do research as well as I can - but instead of checking out the facts you choose to continue to slam people for their imagined sins.

She went to St Monica School in Dallas Tx.

The current tuition in grades Grades K - 8:

1 child $ 6,485
2 children $ 11,900
3 children $ 15,900
4 + children $ 18,200

Others in Dallas: Christ the King $7560/year; Holy Trinity $5210, Mary Immaculate $5180 (here's the list - I hit the first three with working website links. Knock yourself out verifying that I haven't cherry-picked.)

And now that your claim that neither one of them ever set foot in a public school is debunked, you claim the public school that Bill Gates attended isn't bad enough for your standards of a public school, so it doesn't really count as attending a public school. Give me a break.

You'd probably be a lot happier if you knocked that chip off your shoulder.

[Egalitarian Thug]

19. No, I readily admitted that Bill attended one of America's best public elementary schools

until the ripe old age of 12, but your pathetic attempt to paint these scions of power as anything but the ruling class parasites they were born to be is just sad.

I am most gratified that you are concerned with my happiness, but really, it's not at all necessary. We're quite happy and being white, middle aged, well-educated and well-spoken, we will continue to do better than most.

But feel free to worship those that live in a world you pay for but are excluded from, and don't forget to read the sig line.

[Ms. Toad]

20. I don't worship them -

But accuracy is important to me. Your insistence that neither one of them ever set foot inside a public school based on how you imagine all people with privileged act was not accurate. When proven wrong as to one, you insisted the school the other attended must have been far more prestigious that schools available to the average Catholic family. That was wrong as well.

And you do seem to have a chip on your shoulder based on how you imagine all people with money live, rather than the reality of the choices the parents of these two made in raising their children.

[msanthrope]

18. Is your argument that the public school he attended wasn't shitty enough to make it 'real?'

How intriguing.

[Ms. Toad]

21. That's how I take it. n/t

[Rex]

6. "working to improve education..."

[MichiganVote]

7. Yup. Imagine if they were attempting to destroy it. Oh wait, they are.

Oh well, what's a tour in the US among lower to middle class families who have depended on public education for decades to help their kids be successful in life compared to worldwide tours in private jets receiving honors among foreign dignitaries anyway. And to be fair, how much could she really expect to write off on her taxes taking a jaunt around the main streets of the real US.

Here's a clue Melinda Gates: Social Justice Jesus just isn't a church priority and hasn't been one since the 70's.

[leftstreet]

23. +1

[JI7]

12. she had to travel to figure this out ?