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Mark Zuckerberg and wife Priscilla Chan pledge $3bn to cure all disease

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Chan Zuckerberg Initiative will invest $3 billion to cure disease - CNN
https://apple.news/Ah2HJ9_DXTeuB-tOfUaK3qg

In an emotional announcement in San Francisco on Wednesday, Chan said the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative will be investing $3 billion over 10 years to build tools to advance health care.

The first investment is a new $600 million research center called Biohub, in partnership with scientists and researchers from Stanford University; the University of California, Berkeley; and the University of California, San Francisco. The Biohub will focus on building new tools to understand and treat disease.

With her family in the audience, Chan described how the initiative's mission is to prevent or manage all diseases in our children's lifetime — or by the end of the century.

"We want to build a future in which our children can live long and rewarding lives," she said.
The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative focuses global efforts on four areas: personalized learning, curing disease, connecting people and building strong communities.

The initiative is a limited liability company, not a nonprofit.

When the couple launched the initiative in December 2015 — not long after the birth of their daughter, Max — Zuckerberg said he would give away 99% of his Facebook shares through the organization over their lifetimes.
 

wenis

Registered for GAF on September 11, 2001.
That's real cool of them.


How about investing some money in some free health care? Because I'd love to get some stuff checked out at some point.
 

Media

Member
Amazing, please cure autoimmune disease.

...

You know, after you cure the super deadly ones first. I ain't that selfish.
 

Air

Banned
Ambitious and a nice sentiment- but I don't see how they'll be able to cure all diseases. But who knows with how things are advancing.
 

AlteredBeast

Fork 'em, Sparky!
Awesome! Get to it! Who are they funding so I can immediately buy up their penny stocks which will immediately skyrocket in value?

Cure diseases AND make me money. Perfect combo. :)
 

Hazmat

Member
There has to be a better way to phrase that. "Cure all disease" sounds like they might have well pledged $3b to "make all people not be mean."

Anyway, good on them. It's good to see the Zuckerbergs follow in the footsteps of the Gates' and spend their insane wealth on good causes rather than just hoard it like assholes.
 
I think the important part is being able to manage diseases well. Really aging is just one really slow and long disease that inevitably will cause other diseases.
 
"Zuckerberg said he would give away 99% of his Facebook shares through the organization over their lifetimes."

Pulling a Bill Gates, nice.
 
I've always wondered why the ultra wealthy don't donate just a bit of their fortunes for things like this so us average joes don't have to be constantly bombarded with donation requests.
 

xxracerxx

Don't worry, I'll vouch for them.
I've always wondered why the ultra wealthy don't donate just a bit of their fortunes for things like this so us average joes don't have to be constantly bombarded with donation requests.

So their kids can have ridiculous Instagram accounts.
 

The Argus

Member
Bill and Melinda Gates- We will end malaria.

Micheal and Susan Dell - We will stop pediatric cancer.

Michael J Fox - Parkinsons is over.

Mark and Priscilla - Hahaha, we will end all disease.


Good luck to them, but they may be aiming for a few too many distant stars.
 

Cyan

Banned
I've always wondered why the ultra wealthy don't donate just a bit of their fortunes for things like this so us average joes don't have to be constantly bombarded with donation requests.

A lot of them do. Though this is sort of an unusual example since the way Zuck is doing this is super weird--instead of creating a family foundation, he's creating for-profit entities with nominally public-good intentions.
 

subrock

Member
Given the strides in gene editing and AI in the last few years, I don't even think curing all disease is as impossible as I would have 5 years ago
 

xxracerxx

Don't worry, I'll vouch for them.
Bill and Melinda Gates- We will end malaria.

Micheal and Susan Dell - We will stop pediatric cancer.

Michael J Fox - Parkinsons is over.

Mark and Priscilla - Hahaha, we will end all disease.


Good luck to them, but they may be aiming for a few too many distant stars.

Where did Michael J Fox ever say Parkinsons is over?
 

Nocebo

Member
Hopefully SENS foundation will get some of that money. And companies working on 3D printing organs/tissue, CRISPR research...

At any rate, this is exciting news. Hopefully there will be a tipping point where new research into medical technologies will get more and more funding like this.
How about helping with preventative medicine? Its not as fancy as " cure all diseases", but its money well spent.
I think they will go about it intelligently.
Following his wife's announcement, Zuckerberg detailed a roadmap for furthering research and funding. He said the goal is to bring scientists and engineers together to build tools and more technology, while growing a movement to fund science.

Although the effort will take time, Zuckerberg urged "we need to be patient."

Initiative representatives used stage time to discuss some of Biohub's project ideas, such as building a cell atlas that documents all the locations and properties of cell types in humans, incorporating software engineering into databases and developing engineered human stem cells.

"Everything we develop, every tool, will be available to all scientists everywhere," said Dr. Cori Bargmann, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative's incoming president of science.
This all sound extremely promising. If Biohub is focussed on building tools for medical research then naturally those tools can be used in the research for preventative medicine as well. What better way to help cure "all" disease than to try and develop advanced tools. For example a gene editing tool like CRISPR can be used to support and advance all kinds of research and treatments. If more tools like that are developed the future seems very promising.
 

Nocebo

Member
We need more people like Zuckerberg and Gates.
You know what would also help a lot? If more not rich people, "regular" people, started giving money to medical research foundations and the like. Along side or preferably Instead of crowd funding games, people's vacations or potato salad.

It is kind of sad that promising cancer research does not meet its stretch goal but potato salad does. People are more interested in things that are for the "lulz" it seems.
 

DiscoJer

Member
How about helping with preventative medicine? Its not as fancy as " cure all diseases", but its money well spent.

Yeah, and realistically, would save more lives.

While it's sad that people have diseases that can't be cured, it's sadder that many people who are sick have no access to health care that would cure them (or if they do, they are ruined financially for the rest of their lives)
 
I wish there were a billionaire more concerned with the planet's ability to sustain human life vs. all these billionaires making sure there is more human life to sustain, but I know that's a dark train of thought. And beside the point; Zuck is doing a great thing here.
 

subrock

Member
I wish there were a billionaire more concerned with the planet's ability to sustain human life vs. all these billionaires making sure there is more human life to sustain, but I know that's a dark train of thought. And beside the point; Zuck is doing a great thing here.
I mean, Elon Musk is a great candidate for a billionaire trying to stop us from cooking ourselves to death
 
We need more people like Zuckerberg and Gates.

http://givingpledge.org/

There's a change in the air but not enough.

I wish there were a billionaire more concerned with the planet's ability to sustain human life vs. all these billionaires making sure there is more human life to sustain, but I know that's a dark train of thought. And beside the point; Zuck is doing a great thing here.

There is the beginnings of this, Gates again.

https://www.gatesnotes.com/2015-Annual-Letter

It is fair to ask whether the progress we're predicting will be stifled by climate change. The most dramatic problems caused by climate change are more than 15 years away, but the long-term threat is so serious that the world needs to move much more aggressively — right now — to develop energy sources that are cheaper, can deliver on demand, and emit zero carbon dioxide. The next 15 years are a pivotal time when these energy sources need to be developed so they'll be ready to deploy before the effects of climate change become severe. Bill is investing time in this work personally (not through our foundation) and will continue to speak out about it.
 

Liljagare

Member
I honestly only see nanobots as the future. It is cool how many advances has been made, motors the size of a few atoms, selfduplication exists, but the problem remains sensory capabilities.
 

Nocebo

Member
http://givingpledge.org/

There's a change in the air but not enough.
I wish there was change in the air with people who aren't rich. If 3 billion people give 10 or 100 or maybe 1000 dollars once in their life times, let alone multiple times, to important scientific research... Think of the progress that could be made.

But maybe that's not as important as buying a few extra games during the summer sale, to add to an already massive backlog or whatever. Or some useless cosmetic DLC.

Looking at gofundme.com and the like is sometimes disheartening. While thankfully there are also seemingly good causes getting funded, it is ironic however (but understandable) that an individual battling a certain disease can raise the same amount of funds in a few days that takes months to raise for a promising research endeavor that could help thousands or even millions of patients and future patients with that same disease.
 
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