Apparently this is real? In an effort to teach his well-above-median-income audience a lesson about malaria, Bill Gates unleashed an open jar of mosquitoes into the crowd during this week TED (that's Technology, Entertainment and Design, by the way). As he released the critters he calmly informed them that "I brought some [mosquitoes]. Here I'll let them roam around. There is no reason only poor people should be infected."
Yahoo has the rest:
Gates waited a minute or so before assuring the audience the liberated insects were malaria-free.
TED curator Chris Anderson fired back at the legendary computer software maker, joking that the headline for the video of his talk to be posted online at Ted.com would be "Gates releases more bugs into the world."
As he has in travels on behalf of his eponymous charitable foundation, Gates detailed the strides made in dealing with malaria in affluent countries and the need to fight the disease in impoverished nations.
"There is more money put into baldness drugs than into malaria," Gates quipped, triggering laughter. "Now, baldness is a terrible thing and rich men are afflicted. That is why that priority has been set."
Gates called for aggressive distribution of insect netting and other gear proven to protect people from disease-transmitting stings.
Photo by James Jordan and used under a Creative Commons License
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This is kind of terrifying and hilarious. Did Gates pick this trick up from the old Act-UP AIDS protests of the 80s where people were sprayed with fake HIV+ blood?
In California...if one of those mosquitoes actually bit somebody... Gates would be technically guilty of battery, a crime.
When Rachel Carson and her strident rants against DDT stopped its widespread use in Africa and elsewhere...she saved all those folks of having DDT build up in their tissues over years and years and years. Not sure how much that helped, since hundreds of thousands died there from the malaria, yellow fever, dengue fever, and other mosquitoe-borne diseases. Guess those corpses were fotrunate they didn't have all that nasty DDT buildup. Wonder if they would thank Rachel Carson now. Ya think?
And now Bill Gates wants...netting?!?
Thanks Bill...go back to your chipsets and wither away politely.