A coalition of tech companies and philanthropists — including Stripe, Anthropic, and the OpenAI Foundation — has launched a $500 million initiative called Intercept to develop antiviral drugs and scale up air purification technology. The project is co-led by Stripe's head of public goods, Nan Ransohoff, and funded by the non-profit Flu Lab, individual employees of Jane Street, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
On the drug front, Intercept will back human clinical proof-of-concept studies for broad-spectrum vaccines, nasal sprays, and pills targeting multiple respiratory viruses — colds, COVID, and flu — and then hand off promising candidates to big pharma for later-stage development. The air purification side focuses on scaling existing technologies that can block or kill airborne pathogens, while building a buyer network that includes JPMorgan Chase, Mastercard, Meta, Stripe, and Anthropic.
Respiratory infections exact a massive toll on public health and economic productivity. COVID alone killed an estimated 14.9 million people in 2020 and 2021. A study by the UK's Office of Health Economics found that respiratory infections cost British businesses about £44 billion annually.
Not everyone is convinced the plan will work. "The direction is very clear," says Jacco Boon, a respiratory virus expert at the University of Washington. But he warns that with a $500 million initial fund and such sweeping goals — plus too many parallel efforts — it's hard to predict whether the project can scale effectively. Ann Falsey, an infectious disease specialist at the University of Rochester Medical Center, adds that preventing respiratory pathogens across the entire viral spectrum is "scientifically a very difficult endeavor."