Gates, Rockefeller warn leaders about pandemic’s impact

Just ahead of the annual meeting of the U.N. General Assembly that opens on Tuesday, leaders of the Gates and Rockefeller Foundations — grant makers that have committed billions of dollars to fight the coronavirus — are warning that without larger government and philanthropic investments in the manufacture and delivery of vaccines to people in poor nations, the pandemic could set back global progress on education, public health, and gender equality for years.

The calls from philanthropy leaders for more action from wealthy countries comes as President Biden plans to call for a “COVID Summit” to coincide with the meeting, according to news reports.

In an annual analysis of progress made toward development goals set by the United Nations on poverty, access to clean water, gender equality, and other indicators of well-being, the Gates Foundation found that the spread of the pandemic had significantly reversed progress made in recent years.

A big reason is that the disease disproportionately hit poor countries that did not have access to COVID vaccines. More than 80 percent of COVID vaccines have been administered to people in wealthy countries, according to the report. The entire continent of Africa, the report noted, has a population about 300 times that of California. But the number of people vaccinated was roughly the same through the first half of the year.

The health crisis cast a shadow over many measures of well-being. During the pandemic, childhood immunizations over all dropped 7%. Health officials last year predicted it was going to be even worse, but the decline still represents 10 million children who have fallen behind immunization schedules. While men’s employment is expected to return to pre-pandemic levels this year, 13 million fewer women will have jobs...