'Oh my God, you're my brother': Man in his 70s discovers 6 unknown siblings
After receiving a DNA kit one Christmas from his son-in-law, Hugh McCormick soon discovered that he had six unknown siblings, with whom he shared the same birth parents.
Moderna plans to invest up to US$500 million to build a factory in Africa to make up to 500 million doses of mRNA vaccines each year, including its COVID-19 shot, as pressure grows on the pharmaceutical industry to manufacture drugs on the continent.
African countries and the World Health Organization (WHO) have been urging drugmakers for months to set up vaccine plants on the continent to help it secure supplies of COVID-19 shots that have been hoovered up by wealthier nations.
As of Thursday, only about 4.5% of Africans had been fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to the continent's top public health official, John Nkengasong.
Moderna's proposed site is expected to include drug substance manufacturing as well as bottling and packaging capabilities. The U.S. drugmaker said it would begin the process of deciding the country and location soon.
"We expect to manufacture our COVID-19 vaccine as well as additional products within our mRNA vaccine portfolio at this facility," CEO Stephane Bancel said in a statement.
Nkengasong, director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, said he had not seen the Moderna statement and the company had not consulted with him.
At a news conference, he welcomed any efforts to address the continent's medium- to long-term needs, but said Moderna's plans would not solve its problems securing doses now.
The move comes as a debate rages between drugmakers and governments about waiving intellectual property rights for COVID-19 vaccines to help end the pandemic and give more developing countries access to shots.
The United States said it would support a waiver, but the idea has faced opposition from pharmaceutical firms, which argue they need to oversee any technology transfer due to the complexity of the manufacturing process.
Potential candidates to host Moderna's African plant include South Africa, Rwanda and Senegal, health experts say, although a senior South African official involved in a drive to boost local vaccine manufacturing said he wasn't aware of the Moderna announcement. South Africa's health department didn't respond to a request for comment.
Pfizer and its partner BioNTech struck a deal in July for South Africa's Biovac to help make around 100 million doses a year of their COVID-19 vaccine for Africa. BioNTech said in August that it was looking into building malaria and tuberculosis vaccine production sites using mRNA technology in Rwanda and Senegal.
The WHO has been trying to persuade Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech to join forces with its plan for an African tech transfer hub. But a senior WHO official told Reuters last month there hadn't been much progress in talks with Moderna.
Nkengasong said he hoped Moderna would work with an initiative called the Partnerships for African Vaccine Manufacturing launched this year which looks at Africa's needs at a continental level.
"Ten countries in Africa have expressed an interest in vaccine manufacturing, (we) can actually bring them all together and put Moderna at the center of that. ... That would really speak to the need to be transparent and also ... coordinate our efforts," he said.
On Wednesday, Sweden and Denmark paused use of Moderna's vaccine for younger age groups after reports of possible rare cardiovascular side effects and citing data from an unpublished Nordic study. Its shares closed down 9% on Wednesday.
After receiving a DNA kit one Christmas from his son-in-law, Hugh McCormick soon discovered that he had six unknown siblings, with whom he shared the same birth parents.
Four years on, the controversy over whether airlines owed refunds to passengers after cancelling hundreds of thousands of flights during the pandemic continues to simmer, aggravated by a sluggish, opaque complaints process.
Many foods fall under the category of ultraprocessed foods, depending on their exact ingredients. This type of food has been studied a lot lately, and the results aren’t great.
Dozens of Ontarians are expressing frustration in the province’s health-care system after their family doctors either dropped them as patients or threatened to after they sought urgent care elsewhere.
A new study projecting declining rates of cancer cases and deaths in Canada demonstrates the success of prevention and early detection programs, but also highlights areas where more work is needed to save and prolong lives, researchers say.
Brock Boeser had two goals and an assist, and the Vancouver Canucks hung on for a 4-3 win over the Edmonton Oilers in Game 3 of their second-round Stanley Cup playoff series.
An Ottawa pizzeria is being recognized as one of the top 20 deep-dish pizzas in the world.
Police are searching for a male suspect after a man was “slashed in neck” on Sunday morning in downtown Toronto and died.
There were some scary moments for several people on a northern Ontario highway caught on video Thursday after a chain reaction following a truck fire.
English, history, entertainment, math and geography: high school trivia teams could be quizzed on any of it when they compete at the Reach for the Top Nationals in Ottawa in June.
An Ottawa pizzeria is being recognized as one of the top 20 deep-dish pizzas in the world.
A family of fifth generation farmers from Ituna, Sask. are trying to find answers after discovering several strange objects lying on their land.
A Listowel, Ont. man, drafted by the Hamilton Tigercats last week, is also getting looks from the NFL, despite only playing 27 games of football in his life.
The threat of zebra mussels has prompted the federal government to temporarily ban watercraft from a Manitoba lake popular with tourists.
A small Ajax dessert shop that recently received a glowing review from celebrity food critic Keith Lee is being forced to move after a zoning complaint was made following the social media influencer’s visit last month.
The Canada Science and Technology Museum is inviting visitors to explore their poop. A new exhibition opens at the Ottawa museum on Friday called, 'Oh Crap! Rethinking human waste.'
The Regina Police Service says it is the first in Saskatchewan and possibly Canada to implement new technology in its detention facility that will offer real-time monitoring of detainees’ vital health metrics.
Just as she had feared, a restaurant owner from eastern Quebec who visited Montreal had her SUV stolen, but says it was all thanks to the kindness of strangers on the internet — not the police — that she got it back.