Philanthropist and Microsoft co-founder, Bill Gates, has raised fresh concerns over child mortality in Nigeria, warning that a child born in the northern region has a 15 per cent chance of dying before the age of five.

Naijaonpoint reports that Bill Gates made the revelation on Monday at a Reuters Newsmaker event in New York, where he urged governments not to abandon global health funding at a time when millions of children remain at risk.

“You can either be part of improving that or act like that doesn’t matter,” Gates declared in an interview before his foundation’s annual Goalkeepers event.

To reinforce his call, Gates announced that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation will contribute $912 million to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria.

The pledge comes against the backdrop of sweeping aid cuts from governments around the world, particularly from the United States.

“I am not capable of making up what the government cuts, and I don’t want to create an illusion of that,” Gates admitted, stressing that philanthropy alone cannot close the funding gap.

According to the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, global development assistance dropped by 21 per cent between 2024 and 2025, sinking to its lowest level in 15 years.

Gates warned that if the trajectory continues, gains made since 2000 in halving child mortality and saving five million lives annually could be reversed.

“What’s happening to the health of the world’s children is worse than most people realise, but our long-term prospects are better than most people can imagine,” he said.

Naijaonpoint reports that earlier this year, Gates pledged to give away nearly his entire $200bn fortune by 2045, accelerating his timeline in light of the urgent needs worldwide.

He stressed that saving millions more lives would require steady support for institutions such as the Global Fund and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, while also scaling up innovations like lenacapavir, a long-acting HIV prevention drug.

While many governments have slashed health support, Gates noted that Spain increased its contributions to the Global Fund by 12 per cent this year and boosted its Gavi donations by 30 per cent, bucking the trend.

The Gates Foundation, launched in 2000, remains one of the world’s largest backers of maternal health, childhood disease prevention, and poverty reduction.