Fake: That boy in a yellow shirt is not the inventor of COVID-19 vaccine

News Delhi, Dec 11: An old family photograph of a family has gone viral claiming that a boy in yellow clothes is Ugur Sahin, the CEO of German Biotech firm BioNTech, which developed the COVID-19 vaccine along with Pfizer.

The photograph is captioned, 'the power of a safe haven, supporting family and education. Thank Ugur Sahin. A family of Turkish immigrants in Germany in 1970. The boy in the yellow short without shoes is the scientist (Sahin) who developed the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine.

Using reverse search, we found that the image is indeed of a Turkish immigrant family in Germany. However that boy in the image is not Sahin. The picture was clicked by German photographer Candida Hofer and was part of a series called the Turken in Deutschland 1970 or Turks in Germany 1979.

The father came to Germany in 1965 and he brought his family along ten years later to Dusseldorf. The picture was taken a week after the family moved in and as per DiasporaTurk, the boy in the yellow shirt became a lathe-levelling mechanic.

Dr. Sahin's family on the other came from Iskenderun, Turkey.