Not sure he'd be the most qualified, but he seems like a person who take advice from knowledgeable people well and has the experience and current position of leadership to take advantage of it. He also lives right near a huge local outbreak, and so has obvious personal incentive to make sure that it gets cleaned up ASAP.
But he came into that position because he's rich, not because of any particular expertise, and he's been able to accomplish more than others for that same reason. He's done a lot of good, but there is not really any oversight into what his foundation does and no reason to believe he's doing the best possible job. He's just pouring a ton of money into a lot of very hard problems.
If I had to pick someone, I would probably go with the guy who's already done this exact job less than two years ago and has experience with both global health and government service: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._Timothy_Ziemer
> He's just pouring a ton of money into a lot of very hard problems.
To expand on this, those problems take a lot of money to deal with, more than his foundation has, so in a lot of cases, the foundation effectively acts as force multiplier to get even more money on the problems.
> But he came into that position because he's rich, not because of any particular expertise
Except Gates is rich precisely because of expertise and talent. Without a doubt he's one of the best managers alive. Doubly so when those organizations are operating in complex, technically challenging, domains like software or epidemology.
To be completely serious, no it doesn't.
I do not see an appointment of someone who is clearly both richer and smarter to be the frontman of the largest crisis to hit the country in recent history.
During a local non-profit board election I once voted in, one of the candidates' position statements was a single sentence: I may not have a lot skills, but I'm really good at writing checks.
He has experience and credibility in the field and could bring widespread attention to a clear plan to tackle the problem. Everybody already knows what needs to be done to slow down the pandemic, but there needs to be swift and strong political leadership to make it happen.
Maybe not the (emphasis) but his foundation is doing a tremendous amount of work in medicine and disease. He has a lot of knowledge, experience and contacts to set something up.
1. Bill Gates is extremely competitive, he's a bulldog, he fights and wants to win against whatever. He built Microsoft into a Monopoly and is fighting hard (and doing a great job) against diseases.
2. Bill Gates looks at problems logically, finds missing links, and solves those links. Whether that is refrigeration for vaccines, getting useful data for diseases, etc.
3. Bill Gates knows a ton about diseases, epidemics, etc. He's super curious and doesn't stop learning.
Why? Being an MD isn't a huge deal in these cases. Not to say that having knowledge of the fundamentals of biology or healthcare isn't useful, but managing thousands of people, complex human systems, mass organizations, and building a plan to eliminate a disease is not something they teach in medical school.
Gates has done more to battle malaria and other diseases than anyone currently alive. His track record is second to none, in terms of building a huge strategy, managing complex systems, and executing a pragmatic plan. And I suspect he has many MDs in his close circle of advisers who he relies on. A leader doesn't need to be a specialist -- they need to be a leader, a generalist, and rely on a team for specialist knowledge.
MDs are good at treating patients, but they're not necessarily good at leading people.
Good leaders know how to draw on the expertise of others to organize a coordinated response... which the Gates Foundation has proved themselves very capable of doing, particularly with public health issues. The Gates Foundation employs lots of healthcare professionals.
I'd highly suggest looking up some of the talks Gates has done about his work with his foundation. He definitely has his shit together.
Doctors are people who are trained and have experience diagnosing and treating individual patients. I'm not sure why those skills are necessary for fighting an epidemic?
The person in charge of the epidemic will not be doing patient diagnosis and care. The person will be doing some aspects of: Logistics, managing a ton of people, political wrangling, PR/media relations, setting and achieving organizational goals.
Of course some disease and medical knowledge will be required, but not being an MD doesn't seem relevant.
It's always mostly about business/decision making, once you surround yourself with competent people who you can trust - you don't need to be a world-class expert.
He'd obviously consult top doctors. Why would a doctor be better at organizing a large response than a proven business leader who pivoted to disease control?
He's self-made and wealthy because of his qualities and capabilities. That's what people admire. There's no denying that Bill Gates is one of the best executives ever.
I'm pretty sure Bill Gates is worshipped for more than his wealth. Growing up, he was the stereotypical wunderkind and people would say about smart kids "going to be the next Bill Gates". Come on, I was there to type in Microserf and M$ when Microsoft was fucking everyone with the SCO bullshit. That was infuriating, as was all the crap around FAT and NTFS. But you rarely find the combo of technologist and smart businessman.
For all the crap he did, ultimately the Gates Foundation is awesome and it's set up in such a way that it doesn't last forever. All reasons to admire the fellow.
I attended a party at his house with a group of interns. He was worshipped, but in the wrong way -- a number of people wanted to touch his clothing or get his autograph, and they were employees.
I don't think he was ever comfortable with that, and this allows him and his wife to work on interesting problems without causing political problems for MSFT.
There's probably no better qualified person in the world to manage the coordinated effort.