Mark Zuckerberg Donates $25 Million to Ebola Research

On Tuesday morning, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, announced their intent to donate $25 million to help combat Ebola. The funds will go to the Centers for Disease Control Foundation.

“The Ebola epidemic is at a critical turning point. It has infected 8,400 people so far, but it is spreading very quickly and projections suggest it could infect 1 million people or more over the next several months if not addressed,” Zuckerberg wrote in a post on his Facebook page.

“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,” he continued.

Zuckerberg is not the first billionaire philanthropist to donate towards the Ebola fight. In September, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation gave $50 million to the United Nations agencies and international organizations involved in emergency operations in affected African nations.

Microsoft co-founder, Paul Allen, also donated $20 million to his Tackle Ebola campaign.

“Now is the time to respond to this crisis with the speed and resources needed to support all who are working hard to contain, and ultimately tackle, this horrible disease,” Allen said.

Zuckerberg’s complete statement released via Facebook is below.

Priscilla and I are donating $25 million to the Centers for Disease Control Foundation to help fight Ebola.

The Ebola epidemic is at a critical turning point. It has infected 8,400 people so far, but it is spreading very quickly and projections suggest it could infect 1 million people or more over the next several months if not addressed.

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.

We believe our grant is the quickest way to empower the CDC and the experts in this field to prevent this outcome.

Grants like this directly help the frontline responders in their heroic work. These people are on the ground setting up care centers, training local staff, identifying Ebola cases and much more.

We are hopeful this will help save lives and get this outbreak under control.

To learn more about the fight against Ebola: http://www.cdcfoundation.org/ebola-outbreak