More focused than any other govt: Bill Gates applauds India’s efforts to tackle malnutrition, awards it an 'A'

Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft and one of the world’s leading philanthropists, has praised India for its strong focus on combating malnutrition, giving the country an "A" for its commitment to addressing the issue. Speaking to PTI in a recent interview, Gates commended India's approach, emphasising the nation’s open acknowledgment of its nutritional challenges and its determined efforts to resolve them.

"Well, India, for its income level, acknowledges that some of these nutritional indicators are weaker than it would like. That kind of frankness and focus on it, I think is very impressive," Gates said, noting that the Indian government has been more focused on these issues than any other.

Leveraging public systems

Gates highlighted India’s efforts to utilise its public feeding programs to address the malnutrition crisis, pointing to the country's Midday Meal Scheme as a key initiative. "It’s using the public feeding system and the Midday Meal System to try and get fortified foods out, but it's still a huge opportunity," he noted.

The billionaire philanthropist lauded India’s proactive stance, giving the country an "A" for its focus on the malnutrition issue. However, when discussing India’s education sector, he remarked, "I think it probably would rate itself maybe a B for the education but with the real serious intent to do even better."
One of the significant advancements Gates highlighted is the increased understanding of malnutrition, thanks in part to the research funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. "Part of that's been understanding the complex system in your gut, which involves a lot of bacteria. It's called the microbiome. But what we've seen is that if you're missing certain vitamins or if you're missing protein, some kids, their gut gets inflamed, so they can't absorb the food they're eating, and they simply don't grow," Gates explained.

Gates lamented the tragic, long-lasting effects of malnutrition on children, saying, "One of the tragedies of malnutrition is measuring how much a kid loses in terms of their physical capabilities and mental capabilities because of malnutrition at a young age."

The Gates Foundation is working to improve how malnutrition is measured, which could lead to better interventions. "We haven't had a very good measure of that. We're getting better at that," he said.

Lasting impact of malnutrition

Addressing the severe implications of malnutrition, Gates explained the twofold benefits of tackling the issue. "One is that a well-nourished kid is far less likely, twice as less likely to die as they face various disease episodes like diarrhoea or pneumonia during their early years; but the second thing, which is absolutely gigantic, is that because in those early years, your malnutrition, deficits, you can't recover," he emphasised.

He continued, "That is if you don't have full brain development at an early age or full height and strength development when you're older, it doesn't matter if you eat enough, you don't grow those extra inches, gain that strength, or have your brain develop."
Gates called this a "lifelong deficit" and pointed out that reducing malnutrition could be a catalyst for broader economic growth. "India is a great example where if we can reduce malnutrition, it literally helps drive meaningful economic growth," he said.

Global leader in health innovation

Gates stressed that India has the potential to play a crucial role in global health, especially in tackling malnutrition. "It's the place where these new approaches like the probiotic where we have the trials going on," Gates noted, referencing innovative interventions being tested in India.

He also praised the Indian private sector’s involvement in addressing issues like anaemia. "The cost of getting the anaemia in one-time infusion down, it's the Indian private sector making investments in that. And as we see the success of the interventions, that will clearly indicate that in Africa, which has an even more challenging malnutrition problem than India does, what should be the priority in those countries."

According to Gates, India’s progress in the next five years will provide invaluable lessons for other nations facing similar challenges. "In the next five years, a lot will be learnt in India that will provide information for other programmes globally," he predicted.

Growing culture of philanthropy in India

Another positive trend Gates highlighted is the increase in domestic philanthropy in India. "It's been great to see that India has more and more philanthropists domestically, including people in the tech sector," he said.
"We're involved in sharing ideas and really encouraging and celebrating that some of that philanthropy, both individual and corporate, does go against health and malnutrition specifically. We have good partners. If you go back ten years ago, it would have been more limited, like the Tata Trusts and Nandan Nilekani. But now, with additional success and encouragement, it's gotten to be quite a bit broader," Gates elaborated.

Global vaccination efforts

Reflecting on India’s contributions to global health beyond malnutrition, Gates pointed to the country’s role in the global vaccination effort. "The period from 2000 to 2019 was a miracle period," he said. "And it's the result of a lot of things, but the biggest is what we did to get new vaccines out to all the world's children. India played two big roles in that."

"One is, of course, itself that adopted the new vaccines, Rotavirus, pneumococcus, and got very high coverage of those," Gates continued, adding that India also manufactures the majority of these vaccines.

"We've worked with those partners to get not only the volumes up but also to get the cost down. That's allowed GAVI to provide the vaccines basically for free to developing countries," he explained. GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance, was created in 2000 to improve access to vaccines in some of the world’s poorest countries.

Bright future in health

Gates concluded by praising India’s self-reliance and resilience, especially during the pandemic, when many countries struggled with health spending cuts. "Fortunately for India, that's not as much the case. The external debts are not gigantic. You haven't had that kind of squeeze," he said.

He expressed optimism about India’s future in improving health outcomes. "If we can take the latest innovations, including in these nutrition areas, there's every reason to think India can continue the health improvement, including reducing maternal death and childhood death," Gates stated, reinforcing India’s leadership role in global health innovation.

(With inputs from PTI)