Posted on: Tue 29-12-2020

According to a Forbes Magazine report Fifty doctors, scientists and healthcare entrepreneurs earned billionaire status this year.  

Though no Nigerian or African made the list, the majority of the billionaires are from China, where the virus first emerged in December 2019. They all had their fortunes propelled by a stock market surge as investors rallied round companies that were involved in developing vaccines, treatments and medical related devices

 

The most notable billionaires to join this league were ugur sahin and stephane bancel whom were both invovled in the development of the pfizer and german biotech firm BioNTech and Massachusetts-based Moderna, now worth 4.2 billion dollars and 4.1 billion dollars fortune respectively

 

These vaccines will require billions of glass vials to safely transport them — enter Italy’s Sergio Stevanato, a new billionaire and the majority shareholder in the privately-owned Stevanato Group, which is making glass vials for several dozen vaccine efforts around the world.

Among the richest of the Chinese billionaires is Hu Kun, who is the chairman of medical device manufacturer Contec Medical Systems, the outlet reported.

 

Carl Hansen, the CEO of Canadian biotech outfit AbCellera, is now worth $2.9 billion after his company also secured approval of an antibody treatment that it co-developed.

 

Premchand Godha, who is the chairman of Mumbai-based drug-maker Ipca Labs, earned his $1.4 billion fortune thanks in part to the sales of the controversial antimalarial drug hydroxychloroquine, which was hailed early in the pandemic as a possible cure.

---

---