The Mexpat Dispatch: Feb. 13
5 environment + tech stories from the national conversation
Welcome to The Mexpatriate.
A growing measles outbreak in Mexico has brought attention this week to one of President Claudia Sheinbaum’s most lackluster policy inheritances from López Obrador: the public health system.
As politicians play a game of who’s-to-blame table tennis (more on this below), the administration has tried to redirect the national conversation, making noise about a new agreement with U.S. biotech company Moderna to develop and produce vaccines in Mexico.
“There will be joint scientific research…to be able to develop vaccines that are of interest to our country, such as against dengue or even cancer,” said Sheinbaum in a video statement on Monday. Following the controversy over AMLO’s “100% Mexican” Patria COVID-19 vaccine (which has had “some problems” with production, according to Sheinbaum), this agreement signals a tweaked approach—bringing in big foreign biotech to work with the state-owned BIRMEX and a private Mexican pharmaceutical manufacturer (Liomont). The five-year agreement includes a gradual technology transfer to Liomont so it can manufacture mRNA vaccines. Since Moderna was just denied a review of its new mRNA flu vaccine by the U.S. FDA, the company will also be accelerating the search for more markets for its products.
In today’s dispatch for paid subscribers, I cover five environment + tech stories from the national conversation. Watch your inbox on Sunday for the next episode of my podcast, The Mexpat Interview—Alex González Ormerod and I discuss why the political right has lost its way in Mexico, and how it could make a comeback.
