Bill Gates Names 5 Books You Should Read This Summer

It's something of a tradition. Every summer, philanthropist/Microsoft founder Bill Gates recommends five books to read during the slow summer months. This year's list, he tells us, wrestles with some big questions: "What makes a genius tick? Why do bad things happen to good people? Where does humanity come from, and where are we headed?"

And now, without no further ado, here's Bill's list for 2018. The text below is his, not mine:

Leonardo da Vinci, by Walter Isaacson. I think Leonardo was one of the most fascinating people ever. Although today he’s best known as a painter, Leonardo had an absurdly wide range of interests, from human anatomy to the theater. Isaacson does the best job I’ve seen of pulling together the different strands of Leonardo’s life and explaining what made him so exceptional. A worthy follow-up to Isaacson’s great biographies of Albert Einstein and Steve Jobs. [Read his blog post on the book here.]

Everything Happens for a Reason and Other Lies I’ve Loved, by Kate Bowler. When Bowler, a professor at Duke Divinity School, is diagnosed with stage IV colon cancer, she sets out to understand why it happened. Is it a test of her character? The result is a heartbreaking, surprisingly funny memoir about faith and coming to grips with your own mortality. [Read his blog post on the book here.]

Lincoln in the Bardo, by George Saunders. I thought I knew everything I needed to know about Abraham Lincoln, but this novel made me rethink parts of his life. It blends historical facts from the Civil War with fantastical elements—it’s basically a long conversation among 166 ghosts, including Lincoln’s deceased son. I got new insight into the way Lincoln must have been crushed by the weight of both grief and responsibility. This is one of those fascinating, ambiguous books you’ll want to discuss with a friend when you’re done. [Read his blog post on this book here.]

Origin Story: A Big History of Everything, by David Christian. David created my favorite course of all time, Big History. It tells the story of the universe from the big bang to today’s complex societies, weaving together insights and evidence from various disciplines into a single narrative. If you haven’t taken Big History yet, Origin Story is a great introduction. If you have, it’s a great refresher. Either way, the book will leave you with a greater appreciation of humanity’s place in the universe. [Read his blog post on this book here.]

Factfulness, by Hans Rosling, with Ola Rosling and Anna Rosling Ronnlund. I’ve been recommending this book since the day it came out. Hans, the brilliant global-health lecturer who died last year, gives you a breakthrough way of understanding basic truths about the world—how life is getting better, and where the world still needs to improve. And he weaves in unforgettable anecdotes from his life. It’s a fitting final word from a brilliant man, and one of the best books I’ve ever read. [Read his blog post on this book here.]

You can find Gate's reading lists from previous summers in the Relateds below.

via Gates Notes

Related Content:

Bill Gates Recommends Five Books for Summer 2017

5 Books Bill Gates Wants You to Read This Summer (2016)

Bill Gates, Book Critic, Names His Top 5 Books of 2015

Summer 2014

Summer 2013

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Buoy Health, CVS MinuteClinic partner to send patients from chatbot to care

Buoy Health, which offers an AI-powered tool that serves to help people understand potential health problems, announced a partnership with CVS MinuteClinic.

When users go through Buoy Health’s online or app-based chatbot interface, if the suggested possible diagnoses lend themselves to treatment at one of the 1,100 MinuteClinics around the United States, the app will do two things. First, it will use GPS to locate the nearest MinuteClinic, and second, it will offer to hold a place in line for the user.

“We’re still figuring out all the nuts and bolts of the commercial arrangement,” Dr. Andrew Le, CEO of Buoy Health, told MobiHealthNews. “This is the first small bite that we’re taking. But we really feel there are mutual benefits for us. We’re enabling a better patient experience, as is CVS. We’re helping bring affordable care to as many patients as possible. What we’re doing is trying to keep patients out of the ER when not appropriate, out of urgent care when not appropriate. So as an affordable place for those patients to land, the MinuteClinic is a really obvious and really nice place for people to get care.”

Obviously the partnership will also benefit CVS by sending individuals to the MinuteClinic who otherwise might not think of it.

“CVS Health is committed to helping people on their path to better care. We do so by providing high-quality health care services that are convenient, affordable, and accessible for patients,” Dr. Troyen A. Brennan, EVP and chief medical officer at CVS Health, said in a statement. “Entering into a relationship with a health-tech innovator like Buoy to connect their experience to our nationwide network of MinuteClinic providers gives us the opportunity to provide affordable care at times and locations that work best for the patients who utilize this innovative technology.”

Buoy Health launched in March 2017 and raised $6.7 million in August. Le says the company has seen significant traction in the meantime.

“By the end of [2017] we actually hit about two and a half million visitors to the site, which we were really excited about,” he said. “Even more exciting is our growth in 2018. This year we’re actually on pace for somewhere between 25 and 50 million visitors to the site.”

What’s more, the visitors capture an interesting segment of the market, gathering data on patients in the early stages of symptoms that can then be used to train Buoy’s machine learning algorithm to be even better.

“What’s interesting is that 65 percent of our users have had symptoms for less than 12 hours when they come to Buoy,” Le said. “Data on how symptoms evolve, that kind of data just doesn’t exist. So as we see patients we’re capturing a snapshot of suffering that’s really unique and interesting for us.”

Le says MinuteClinic is a first step: the company hopes eventually to be able to automatically refer users to a number of different services based on their particular needs.

“We’re going to continue to partner with innovative providers and payers across the country to help patients who have different severity levels find that type of care,” he said. “Whether it’s emergency care, or primary care, or a weight loss program, or behavioral health, all those other services we’re going to continue to partner such that people can really count on coming to Buoy, understanding what to do, and then enabling them to do it. So this is kind of our first step in doing so.”

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