Tal Zaks, Moderna Chief Medical Officer, on His Jewish Identity & Scientific Career

As Chief Medical Officer at Moderna, Israeli scientist Dr. Tal Zaks has helped lead the global recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. Under Zaks’ leadership, Moderna produced the first mRNA vaccine to enter clinical trials and one of the first to be authorized by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Zaks has deep roots in Israel, where both his mother and father’s families immigrated in the 1930s. He comes from a family of mathematicians; his father was one of the founding members of the mathematics department at the University of Haifa and served as President of the Israeli Mathematical Union. Zaks served as an ambulance driver and medic in the Israeli Defense Forces, where he became interested in patient care, and later earned his M.D. and Ph.D. from Ben Gurion University in Be’er Sheva. Watch Zaks in conversation with Mattie Kahn, the Culture Director at Glamour, about his family background, his Jewish and Israeli identities, and his life-saving work on Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine. Legacies is made possible with a gift from Marc Kirschner in honor of Nancy Fisher.