Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is putting big bucks into the effort to eradicate Ebola — donating $25 million to the CDC to help fight the deadly disease.
The social network billionaire and his wife, Priscilla Chan, believe the epidemic is “at a critical turning point,” infecting more than 8,400 worldwide with the possibility of spreading to 1 million people in the next few months.
“We need to get Ebola under control in the near term so that it doesn’t spread further and become a long-term global health crisis that we end up fighting for decades at large scale, like HIV or polio,” Zuckerberg said in a Facebook post.
“We believe our grant is the quickest way to empower the CDC and the experts in this field to prevent this outcome,” he wrote.
Zuckerberg, who is worth an estimated $32 billion, added that these types of monetary endowments “directly help” front-line responders “in their heroic work.”
He hopes the money will be used to set up care centers, train staff and eventually eradicate the disease.
“We are hopeful this will help save lives and get this outbreak under control,” Zuckerberg said.