As on Monday (March 23), 343,394 people have been infected, while 14,774 have lost their lives due to the Covid-19 pandemic. From a complete shut-down to widespread testing, governments all over, are striving hard to curb the outbreak and treat the diseased.
Currently, there isn't any vaccine for the disease and medical workers are at the fore-front, in this battle. At a gory time like this, what have the richest of the rich contributed during this global fight against the novel coronavirus pandemic?
Bill Gates
Microsoft co-founder, Bill Gates, has described Covid-19, as a "once-in-a-lifetime pathogen." The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, has committed $100 million to aid global detection, isolation and treatment of the virus.
Jack Ma
"The first shipment of masks and coronavirus test kits to the US is taking off from Shanghai" Ma tweeted on March 16, his first after joining the micro-blogging website.
The supplies worth $6 million medical supplies, donated by the Chinese billionaire, arrived in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, on Sunday. Supplies sent by the Alibaba founder, include 5.4 million face masks, 1.08 million testing kits, 40,000 sets of protective clothing and 60,000 protective face shields, which will be distributed among African nations.
Rwandan President Paul Kagame, took to Twitter to express his "gratitude" for the Chinese billionaire.
Ethipian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed also took to Twitter to thank Ma.
He sent 1.8 million masks, 210,000 test kits, 36,000 protective suits, ventilators and thermometers, to ten Asian countries. "Go Asia!", he tweeted.
Similar relief material has been donated to Japan, Korea, Italy, Iran and Spain. During the early stages of the outbreak, he had donated $14 million for the development of coronavirus vaccine, CNN reported.
Mike Bloomberg
The media titan has committed $40 million to prevent and slow its [Covid-19] spread around the world, particularly in Africa.
Apple
"We're donating millions of masks for health professionals in the US and Europe", Apple's CEO Tim Cook, tweeted.
Elon Musk
Tesla and SpaceX founder and CEO, Elon Musk, donated "a truckload of PPEs (masks, gowns, etc.) to UCLA Health facility", director Peyton Reed tweeted.
Musk said his company is making ventilators and expects to have over 1,200 to distribute this week.
Facebook donated 720,000 masks, that they sourced during California's wildfires. "We're also working on sourcing millions of more to donate", he added.
