President of the Republic Paul Kagame received Bill Gates, founder and chair of the Gates Foundation, and the two discussed various matters aimed at continuing to strengthen the existing partnership between the Foundation and Rwanda in sectors including health and agricultural development.
The American billionaire is in Rwanda on a visit aimed at touring various health-related projects, with the goal of continuing the partnership between his Foundation and Rwanda.
The Office of the President of Rwanda said: “This evening in Kigali, President Kagame met with Bill Gates, Founder and Chair of the Gates Foundation. They discussed strengthening the Foundation’s longstanding partnership with Rwanda, including accelerating collaboration in health, agricultural transformation, AI, and digital public infrastructure to advance Rwanda’s development priorities.”
Bill Gates, who is in Rwanda, on Monday visited various sites including a factory that manufactures medical syringes, located in Rwamagana District.
Before beginning this visit, the billionaire said that Rwanda is a model country in improving its health sector, having used innovation to advance this sector, yielding impressive results.
In an interview with CNBC, Bill Gates said the innovations Rwanda has put in place in this sector have meant that: “Since 2000, the number of Rwandan children who die before reaching the age of five has dropped by 80%, and the number of women who die in childbirth, along with newborn deaths, has dropped by 85%. This has been achieved through long-term investment in strengthening primary healthcare, supporting Community Health Workers, and building institutions such as the Rwanda Biomedical Centre (RBC).”
Bill Gates also said that during this visit he plans to meet with senior Rwandan government officials, leaders in the health sector, innovators, researchers, as well as university students, in order to better understand their work and collaboration in advancing people’s wellbeing.
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