What's Bill Gates up to these day? The software mogul turned philanthropist wants to wipe polio off the face of the earth.
In the summing up the work of Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, he writes, the world is "on the threshold of ending polio once and for all."
Since 1988 when 166 countries resolved to eradicate polio, cases of the paralyzing 鈥� from 350,000 to about 1,600 reported in .
But there are problems. Polio was supposed have been consigned to history by the year 2000.
While polio is pretty much a disease of the past in the developed world, transmission of the virus from person to person has never been completely stopped in four countries: Afghanistan, India, Nigeria and Pakistan.
And there have been some worrisome outbreak, including , which marked the first cases of the illness in the first cases there in 19 years.
So Gates is calling for more money to get the job done. Last week Gates and U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron to the polio eradication initiative that could be worth as much as $166 million.
The Gates Foundation give about $200 million a year to they cause, Gates' letter says. But for the 2011-2012 period, the polio eradication work faces a .
Gates is holding a Monday morning. In his letter, he writes:
If eradication fails because of a lack of generosity on the part of donor countries it would be tragic. We are so close, but we have to finish the last leg of the journey.
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