- The Washington Times - Friday, December 18, 2020

German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Friday thanked the husband-and-wife founders of BioNTech who are behind a first-in-the-west coronavirus vaccine developed with Pfizer.

In a virtual visit, she congratulated Ugur Sahin, Ozlem Tureci and their Mainz company ahead of vaccine distribution in the European Union on Dec. 27.

“We are incredibly proud to have such researchers in our country,” she said.

Ms. Merkel wanted to know if they were sitting over coffee one day and simply decided, “This is what we’re going for now.”

Ms. Tureci said it was something like that, recalling how Mr. Sahin read about mysterious cases in Wuhan, China, and concluded “a pandemic was looming — something everyone only realized later.”

“He alerted us and convinced all of us — our entire company, our supervisory board, our shareholders — to pivot from cancer therapy to this program and to redirect our resources into developing a vaccine,” Ms. Tureci said.

The Germany firm, which focuses on immune therapies and is a pioneer in “messenger RNA,” is sometimes overshadowed by its giant partner in the COVID-19 fight, Pfizer of New York City.

The vaccine they created together is already in use in the U.S., Canada and the U.K.

Ms. Merkel thanked BioNTech as Germany tries to stave off a rising caseload and death toll with an economic lockdown that extends through Christmas and into January.

Germany recorded 813 deaths on Thursday, its second-worst day of the pandemic.

President Trump frequently notes that other countries are struggling with the virus, not just the U.S.

“Europe and other parts of the World being hit hard by the China Virus — Germany, France, Spain and Italy, in particular. The vaccines are on their way!!!” he tweeted Friday.

• Tom Howell Jr. can be reached at thowell@washingtontimes.com.

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