As the federal government continues to slash funding for scientific research, clean energy, social services, public safety, and education, billionaire philanthropists have increasingly stepped in to fill the gap. The National Institutes of Health, the largest public funder of biomedical research in the United States, has been among the agencies facing significant proposed reductions, heightening uncertainty for university research programs that depend on federal grants. MacKenzie Scott, for instance, has deployed her $26 billion philanthropy to support organizations such as The Trevor Project, the Center for Disaster Philanthropy, and historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) left vulnerable by the Trump administration's funding cuts.

Now the Gates Foundation is making a major move of its own, committing a historic $540 million gift to the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), an independent research organization at the University of Washington. According to the University of Washington's announcement, the 10-year grant will support broader access to freely available scientific health evidence used by governments, researchers, and policymakers to improve health outcomes both nationally and globally.

The funding will enable IHME to expand its Global Burden of Disease study, growing from roughly 925 locations today to nearly 5,000, dramatically improving the granularity of health data available worldwide. The institute gained wide public attention during the COVID-19 pandemic, when its independent modeling projections were cited by governments and health agencies worldwide to forecast infection and mortality trajectories.

"Reliable and independent evidence can mean the difference between reacting to a health crisis after it has taken hold and acting early enough to change its course," said Dr. Christopher J.L. Murray, IHME director and professor of health metrics sciences, in a statement. "This investment will allow us to provide high-quality evidence at a much more local level and help leaders understand not only where health is improving or worsening, but which decisions can make the greatest difference for people."

The grant builds on a longstanding partnership. The $89 billion philanthropic organization provided the founding investment to establish IHME at the University of Washington in 2007.

Context: Epstein Scrutiny and Buffett's Departure

The gift arrives amid lingering scrutiny over the foundation's alleged connections to Jeffrey Epstein, the deceased and disgraced financier and convicted sex offender. Those ties contributed in part to the severing of the relationship between the Gates Foundation and its most prominent supporter, Warren Buffett.

A recently released external review commissioned by the Gates Foundation found that Bill Gates and his staff met with Epstein more than two dozen times. According to the review, the conversations appeared to focus solely on a public health fund that was never realized, as well as a grant to the International Peace Institute, which was run by an Epstein associate.

"Earlier this year, the foundation acknowledged that it regretted having any employees interact with Epstein in any way," according to a Gates Foundation statement. The review found no evidence that the foundation paid Epstein. "It also found no evidence of participation in, or knowledge of, Epstein's ongoing sex trafficking operations or criminal activities," the statement continued.

A Foundation Racing to Close

Last summer, before any Epstein-related connections surfaced publicly, Fortune was the first to report that the charitable organization would wind down in 2045. That announcement marked an aggressive acceleration of the foundation's giving. In early 2026, the organization announced it would give away $9 billion this year in preparation for its closure, while also eliminating hundreds of jobs.

Gates has pledged to give away virtually his entire fortune, spending more than $200 billion through 2045—double the approximately $100 billion the foundation had already disbursed in its first 25 years. He told Fortune that the compressed timeline was deliberate: "By spending the money sooner than later, it allows us to be very ambitious," he said in a 2025 conversation with Fortune's former senior reporter Alexa Mikhail.

Global Health at the Core

Global health has been the foundation's defining focus since Bill Gates and Melinda French Gates launched it 25 years ago. The organization helped establish two of the field's most consequential institutions: Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. The Gates Foundation credits those efforts with helping save 82 million lives since 2000.

Over its final two decades, the foundation has said it will concentrate on three priorities: ending preventable maternal and child deaths, eradicating deadly infectious diseases, and lifting people out of poverty.

The new IHME gift fits squarely within that mission—and within an evolving landscape where billionaire philanthropy is increasingly backfilling the retreat of federal funding. This shift has prompted ongoing debate among policy experts about accountability and transparency, as private foundations operate with fewer public oversight requirements than the government agencies that have traditionally funded such research.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com.