Two years after first gathering with a group of health experts to dine and discuss the looming COVID-19 crisis, Bill Gates reassembled the group for more food and a conversation about lessons learned.
In a new video series on the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation website, called “The Working Dinner,” the first episode (above) features Gates and friends sharing stories over food catered by a Pakistani food truck.
Gates’ guests in the first episode include:
- Anita Zaidi, who oversees the Gates Foundation’s efforts to achieve gender equality and is director of the Vaccine Development & Surveillance, and Enteric and Diarrheal Disease programs.
- Keith Klugman, who leads the Gates Foundation’s work to reduce child deaths from pneumonia, neonatal sepsis, and meningitis.
- Dr. Lynda Stuart, who previously led the Vaccine and Host Pathogen Biology domain of the Discovery and Translational Sciences team at the Gates Foundation.
The four first gathered for dinner in February 2020 to discuss the COVID-19 outbreak in China and what it might mean for the rest of the world.
Gates says in the video that he was thinking at the time, “either I should stop worrying about this thing or we should all worry a heck of a lot more.”
He remembered Klugman saying, “It’s gonna spread.”
Two years later, at their recent meal, the experts expressed surprise at the way the crisis played out, especially in the U.S., where “we were just totally unprepared,” Klugman said. In perhaps the episode’s most somber moment, they discuss the nearly 1 million U.S. deaths.
“Who would have predicted we would be sitting here two years later with the U.S. having more [COVID] deaths than any other country on the planet?” Klugman said. “That’s unthinkable.”
In the episode, the group discusses vaccines, helping developing countries, the Foundation’s role, face masks, how to prevent the next pandemic, and more. In typical Gates fashion, the episode ends with an optimistic tone.
The Gates Foundation website lists two more upcoming episodes, “Inequities and the Road to Recovery,” which features Melinda French Gates, and “New Variants, New Challenges.”
