After Gates warned that U.S. aid cuts would cost millions of lives, Musk’s response was a personal jab fueled by an old grudge over a Tesla stock bet.
The tech world’s most consequential feud has flared up again. Elon Musk and Bill Gates, two men who have shaped the modern world, are locked in a bitter public dispute, this time over foreign aid cuts with life or death stakes. The conflict pits Musk, in his role spearheading a government efficiency initiative, against Gates, the world’s most prominent philanthropist.
A little over a month after Musk’s departure from his role in the Trump administration, where he led efforts to slash federal spending, Gates took to X, Musk’s own social network, to condemn the devastating impact of those cuts on global health.Gates Lays Out the Stakes
Drawing on new reports, Gates presented a grim tally of the human cost. “A study in the Lancet recently looked at the cumulative impact of reductions in American aid. It found that, by 2040, 8 million more children will die before their fifth birthday,” Gates posted on July 3, linking to the medical journal’s study.
He followed up by highlighting the threat to HIV treatment programs. “According to a @UNAIDS analysis, ending PEPFAR-supported programs for people living with HIV could result in an additional 4.2 million deaths by 2029,” Gates stated, providing a link to the report.
Driving the point home, he warned that pulling vaccine funding would have catastrophic results. Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, has helped immunize over 1.
