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How to Prevent the Next Pandemic

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About this listen

Brought to you by Penguin.

Before Bill Gates became an expert on climate science, he was known as one of the few who studied pandemics - how they start, how they spread, how they can be controlled. He warned us years ago in a now-famous TED Talk of their arrival in our future. The future, of course, is now, and now is when we have to plan against a next one.

HOW TO PREVENT THE NEXT PANDEMIC is a clear and upbeat plan of what every country, every government leader, and every individual can do in order to help prevent another pandemic, grounded in Bill's firsthand experience with the Gates Foundation's commitment to fighting Covid-19.

© Bill Gates 2022 (P) Penguin Audio 2022

 Contagious Diseases Economics Medicine & Health Care Industry Physical Illness & Disease Policy & Administration Politics & Government Government Medicine

Critic reviews

Every expert's door opens to Gates and he is a fiendish researcher ... formidably informative ... One of his most intruiging insights was that there is a rough correlation between how much people trust their governments and a country's success in fighting the pandemic ... he comes up with four recommendations - make better tools to deal with infectious diseases; develop his pandemic fire brigade; help pooer countries to develop disease surveillance; and strengthen primary health care systems, especially in low and middle-income countries. Who could argue? (Bryan Appleyard)
In 2015, the American technologist and philanthropist Bill Gates warned that humanity wasn't ready for a pandemic. Seven years on, as the world emerges (hopefully) from a pandemic for which it wasn't ready, he thinks we have it within our power to make sure this one was the last. There will be more disease outbreaks, but we now possess the tools and the knowledge to prevent them from becoming global catastrophes. Gates's optimism is refreshing after the gloom of the last two years. ... The roadmap he lays out sounds feasible. It involves strengthening disease surveillance and strengthening primary healthcare systems around the world ... Gates's proposals are wise, and his goals should be our goals. (New Statesman)

In this concise and lucid book, global health activist Gates reflects on the current COVID-19 pandemic, considers future ones, and renders several sensible recommendations for prevention . . . Passionate but never preachy, Gates delivers an expert, well-reasoned, and robust appeal for the world to unite in averting upcoming pandemics.

(Booklist)
Gates is good at guiding readers through his blueprint for the technological, economic and regulatory fixes to stop the next pathogen from causing global havoc, never assuming too much knowledge. ... His book is punctuated with powerful examples from personal experience. ... How to Prevent the Next Pandemic ... couldn't be more timely, with thousands still dying daily. As he writes, "once covid is no longer an acute threat, don't forget about what it has done". (Adam Vaughan)
if this book stimulates even a little limit-pushing of the sort Mr Gates suggests, it will have served its purpose well.
His last book was about climate change, that other issue which, along with pandemics, he considers "existential" for mankind. ... Now, with the same can-do, roll-up-the-sleeves attitude, he lays out, step by step, the system that needs to be put in place to prevent another - potentially far more deadly - pandemic. (Harry de Quetteville)
All stars
Most relevant
I enjoyed this from beginning to end although Wil is reading it as though the list is 4 years old!! It’s very informative. Don’t listen to the 1* reviews as they’re biased against Bill Gates just assuming he’s a tech billionaire who cares about nothing. He’s invested billions of dollars in his foundation and other charities and really seems to care for others. Good story and well written

A really good listen

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Bill Gates involvement with efforts to fight COVID is the subject of many wild and wacky conspiracy theories including that he is now monitoring everyone who had a vaccine. While he is busy monitoring my comings and goings between the supermarket, work home etc he managed to write a book suggesting many ways that we can prevent the next pandemic (man-made or natural). The book is full of great plans that will never happen as most rely on the majority of world governments agreeing to do something and then doing it even where there may be no evidence within their tenure that it has saved money. Just like they are with climate control which is now spiralling towards making the earth slightly warmer than Venus.
The book is filled with many great ideas that I am sure will go some way towards preventing the next natural pandemic although I am not so sure about man-made bio terrorist events as if I were them I would read this book and make sure my lab created virus could get by the controls he suggests.
I ‘read’ this via an audio book but after completing it I realise that it would have been much better as a traditional book as it is something I am sure I would like to refer to later on and this format does not make that easy.
Overall an interesting book with some great ideas but will probably only serve as something to look back at when the earths’ population has been decimated so we can say if only…...

How goverments will not save us all from future pa

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Books seems great, but had to stop at 2nd chapter due to terribly irritating and condescending narration. Would be great if this got re-recorded…

Bad narration

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This book is quite simply awful. It is corrupt, biased and highlights how the world has been manipulated through corporations and privileged elites.

Awful!

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Don't listen to the reviews saying the narration is bad - while yes Bill Gates narrates the introduction and sample - another narrator steps in at chapter 1. Bill Gates can't narrate to save his life, he truly is an atrocious narrator and sounds like a robot, however, the main narrator is much better.

The book is very informative however it's very biased towards one side. Nothing in this book about how lockdowns cause mental health issues, or how lockdowns absolutely destroyed many small businesses, or how people were fined for breaking covid rules...simply for sitting on a park bench OUTSIDE. and the things he did mention like how people couldn't see loved ones before they die, he refused to go into the devastating effects of this. Same with schools closing - he only briefly mentioned it without going into the detail. it's clear this book is pushing an agenda but that doesn't mean it's not informative. I've learned a lot of legit information from this book.

Trying to be open minded

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