Improved investments, partnerships, and the development of homegrown artificial intelligence solutions for Africa’s health sector were at the heart of discussions at the Gatekeepers event organised by the Gates Foundation.
At the gathering, which attracted the crème de la crème in the country and beyond, including the Chair of the Gates Foundation, Bill Gates; Chairman of Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote; Gombe State governor, Inuwa Yahaya; Lagos State governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, among others, they agreed that healthcare on the continent can be better with improved funding and the development of local solutions, among other strategies.
During a panel discussion, Gates recalled the Gates Foundation’s investment in healthcare in Africa, particularly Nigeria.
According to the Microsoft Co-Founder, the foundation has invested about $100bn in healthcare in the country over the past 25 years, hinging it on the Gates Foundation’s guiding principle that all lives have equal value.
$100bn Spent In 25 Years
“Over 70 per cent of what we’ve spent, the $100 billion we’ve spent in these last 25 years, went to global health, and throughout that 25 years, we’ve developed the partnerships, throughout Africa,” he said at the event anchored by celebrity host Ebuka Obi-Uchendu in the Victoria Island area of Lagos State on Wednesday.
Gates highlighted the importance of partnership in delivering quality healthcare, but believes governments across the board play critical roles in making the health sector thrive.
“Here in Nigeria, we’ve had amazing partners who understand the delivery and the way that we can work and help the government.
‘’The government, in the long run, has the responsibility for all of this work. We’re there to accelerate these systems,” he said.
He re-echoed the importance of good health, linking improved healthcare to a better economy. Gates also believes that the global child mortality rate can be reduced in Africa.
He expressed optimism that the global child mortality rate can be reduced by 50 per cent from the current five million cases worldwide.
“These next 20 years, you know, the countries in Africa will get to that status. So helping them accelerate that, helping them understand what the unique local challenges are, which things we need to make simpler, and bring the price down.
That’s done, as a partnership, and the last 25 years went way better than I expected; that is, childhood death, globally and in Africa, was cut in more than half,” he said.
He also said artificial intelligence can help Africa fast-track its health goals.
How Gombe Improved Healthcare – Inuwa Yahaya
Also speaking at the event, Governor Yahaya said his administration has been able to improve the health budget and track the attendance of health workers in the state.
“Today, immunisation coverage has improved to around 50 percent, and access to primary healthcare has risen to between 40 and 45 percent. In addition, we now have the required infrastructure across the health sector,” Governor Yahaya said.
According to the governor, the deployment of technology — the use of biometrics —helped in improving service delivery for health workers.
“The resultant effect is not just in increased attendance, but also in improved maternal and child healthcare, as well as reduced mortality rates,” he said.
“The operations of the primary health centres have also improved — absenteeism has significantly declined, and the staff are well motivated, performing even beyond our expectations.”
Nigeria Can Stop Medical Tourism – Dangote
For Dangote, the partnership with the Gates Foundation was instrumental in the eradication of polio, and he said that with more investments, Nigeria can become a leading drug manufacturing hub.
Dangote stressed the need for Nigerians to be able to access quality healthcare and added that partnership with the Gates Foundation can make that possible.
“What we need to do is to make sure we stop this health tourism, and we should now get to start producing our own drugs,” Dangote said. “We should now make sure that when we are sick, we don’t have to travel abroad, all of us, but we need to do a partnership with Bill (Gates).”
He said his company has invested massively in local production, which has yielded results in the country exporting cement more than any other African nation.
Support for Local Startups Localisation of AI,
Others who spoke at the gathering included the Founder/CEO of Mamamoni, Nkem Okocha, who called for more support for local startups.
Another panelist and the CEO of Data Scientists Network (DSNai), Bayo Adekanmbi, said artificial intelligence must be localised for Africans to reap improved dividends. For the Founder and CEO of Healthtracka, Ifeoluwa Dare-Johnson, the dream is to build an Africa where nobody dies of an illness that could be treated when caught early.
Wawira Njiru of Food for Education said scaling businesses in Africa is taxing, but says the drive to leave a better continent is a greater drive.
M.I., Kaffy, Waje, Urban Choir Thrill Audience
To spice up the event, rapper M.I. Abaga, Kafayat Shafau, better known as Kaffy, Aituaje Iruobe, popularly known as Waje, and the Loud Urban Choir were on hand to thrill the audience.
The Goalkeepers event brought together global leaders, policymakers, and changemakers to assess progress toward the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It was hosted by the Gates Foundation.
Bill Gates: $100 Billion Investment in Healthcare Over 25 Years Strengthens Partnerships in Nigeria and Beyond
The Chair of the Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, has said that the $100 billion spent by the foundation in the last 25 years to improve healthcare in Africa has helped to develop partnerships in Nigeria and other countries on the continent.
Gates disclosed this at Goalkeepers, a live event organised by the Gates Foundation in Lagos on Wednesday.
He explained that when the Foundation started in 2000, the basic guiding principle was that all lives have equal value, with a major concern about reducing infant mortality globally, especially in Africa.
“And so I looked and I said, okay. Are people taking this seriously, are they making the medicines cheaper, or are they tailoring the medicines to the particular needs of those areas, for example, investing in new malaria tools? And the answer was no.
“And so, that became the guiding light for the Gates Foundation. Over 70 per cent of what we’ve spent, the $100 billion we’ve spent in these last 25 years, went to global health, and throughout that 25 years, we’ve developed the partnerships, throughout Africa,” he said.
“Here in Nigeria, we’ve had amazing partners who understand the delivery and the way that we can work and help the government. The government, in the long run, has the responsibility for all of this work. We’re there to accelerate these systems,” he added.
Chair of the Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, and Gombe State Governor, Inuwa Yahaya (middle), at the Goalkeepers event in Lagos on Wednesday, June 4, 2025
Gates noted that improving health accelerates the economic growth of a country to a point where it can become self-sufficient. He expressed optimism that the global child mortality rate can be reduced by 50 per cent from the current five million cases worldwide.
He explained, “These next 20 years, you know, the countries in Africa will get to that status. So helping them accelerate that, helping them understand what the unique local challenges are, which things we need to make simpler, and bring the price down. That’s done, as a partnership, and the last 25 years went way better than I expected; that is, childhood death, globally and in Africa, was cut in more than half.
“We went from almost 10 million worldwide to now less than five million. And I feel confident we can cut that in half again, even though, as you mentioned, right now, we’re in a stunning and completely unjust withdrawal of support from a number of rich governments, including the United States, but even despite that, which is going to make the next four or five years, we’ll have some reversal because it’s just too large and too sudden to overcome. We will get back to incredible progress reducing those.”
New, Cheap Vaccines
The co-founder of Microsoft further stated that the number of children who die every year has gone down faster every year for the last 25 years, over three times faster than ever in history.
“And there are some, you know, very key things that were done there. There were new vaccines that were made cheaper, like rotavirus, pneumococcus, penta. And Gavi is a group that helps fund most of those costs to make sure they get to all the world’s children.
“So that loan, the bed nets for malaria, the preventing HIV transmission from mother to child, you know, a little bit of progress on malnutrition, that will be a big thing in the years ahead. So all that came together, and people started looking at vaccine coverage, and various countries can compare their vaccine coverage,” Gates said.
He added, “There are some countries in Africa that have over 95 per cent vaccine coverage, better than the United States. There are some countries that only have like 50 per cent vaccine coverage.
“So, there is hope that we can still make progress even if there’s a decline in the best ideas from all over Africa and sharing them; that alone would be a gigantic thing.”
