Stacy BrownMedia

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia
Pfizer has announced the signing of a letter of intent with BioNTech SE for the co-development and distribution of a coronavirus vaccine aimed at preventing COVID-19 infection.
The companies have a head-start on working together, since the partnership builds on a 2018 agreement to jointly develop an mRNA-based influenza vaccine, according to a March 17, 2020 report in Forbes Magazine.
The agreement covers co-development an...

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia
While many medical doctors maintain that the novel coronavirus is transmitted through droplets from coughs or sneezes, more and more medical experts and officials who work primarily with infectious respiratory illnesses and aerosols are convinced that the disease is airborne.
Today, as a result of recent medical research and data, The National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) President and CEO, Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr. ...

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia
As COVID-19 continues to spread amid a growing number of fatalities, Dr. James Hildreth said it’s critical that everyone follows stay-at-home orders, social distancing guidelines, and anything else that could help keep Americans safe during the pandemic.
Dr. Hildreth, the president of Meharry Medical College, is not just your everyday physician, or media talking head. He’s a renowned infectious disease expert who has repea...

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia
National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) President and CEO Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr., authored an op-ed for The Hill, a major daily publication that’s known to influence policy in the nation’s capital.
Chavis’s op-ed focused on the NNPA Coronavirus Task Force and Resource Center, which is helping to shine a spotlight on the health disparities that the African American community face daily.
The task force includes...

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia
It is human nature to want to say the right thing at the right time. To utter words that just might help heal.
I recall working at The Times-Tribune newspaper in Scranton, Pennsylvania, in the mid-2000s.
I had been assigned the City Hall beat, which meant covering the most dysfunctional city council ever assembled. Things were so bad that Times-Tribune columnist Chris Kelly had a name for the many angry citizens who attend...

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia
Hip-hop and business mogul Russell Simmons has seen the devastation of the novel coronavirus and the effect it has had on his hometown of Hollis Queens, New York, and the rest of the world.
Now the iconic Def Jam founder is bringing back one of his legendary creations to help raise money for those devastated by the pandemic.
Simmons is leading a group of producers who, on Sunday, April 5, will premiere “Def Comedy Jam Pres...

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia
The University of Virginia Health System (UVA) has joined a national clinical trial testing a potential COVID-19 medication.
“I enrolled the first patient on the clinical trial for Remdesivir,” Dr. Taison Bell, an infectious disease expert who specializes in critical care at the Charlottesville-based health system, told NNPA Newswire in an email.
Hospitalized adult patients with COVID-19 and significant symptoms – includin...

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia
The National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) has debuted a new feature for our subscribers and visitors to BlackPressUSA.com. We will regularly conduct live interviews on Facebook.com/blackpressusa and BlackPressUSA.com.
We will feature interviews with those who are making an impact in communities around the country. The first livestream, conducted on Monday, April 6, was a reminder that education is still essentia...

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia
More than 825,000 people around the globe have been infected with the novel coronavirus, including at least 175,600 in America.
Now the coronavirus has hit a member of our family.
Jeffrey L. Boney, a multi-award-winning writer for the Houston Forward Times and the National Newspaper Publishers Association, is in the intensive care unit at United Memorial Medical Center in Houston after being diagnosed on Friday, March 27, ...

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior Correspondent

@StacyBrownMedia

Mann Up, a prison program that’s helping to change the lives of African American men with long sentences, has received a significant boost with the presence of Bill Cosby.

The program, which empowers and encourages black males to be better fathers, husbands, and community members, is thriving inside the walls of SCI-Phoenix, the maximum-security prison where Cosby is serving a three-to-ten-year prison sentence.

In addition...

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia
November 24, 2019 — Bill Cosby breaks his silence, granting his first exclusive interview since beginning his sentence at SCI-Phoenix, a maximum-security Pennsylvania penitentiary near Philadelphia.
Today, in a special phone call with the National Newspaper Publishers Association’s BlackPressUSA.com, Cosby said he’s spending his time helping to teach and encourage a large population of African American inmates – men he cal...

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Correspondent@StacyBrownMedia
When the National Football League invited Rihanna to perform at the upcoming Super Bowl, the 9-time Grammy winner and Fenty business mogul took a knee.
Reportedly, the pop princess not only said, “No,” but her words were more like, “Hell no.”
Rihanna said she’s showing solidarity with Colin Kaepernick and NFL players who have been protesting racial disparities and police violence against blacks and other minorities by kneeling dur...

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia
In South Carolina sports lore, no program is more revered by African Americans than the South Carolina State University Bulldogs. And, not many coaches are as beloved as Oliver “Buddy” Pough.
When the Bulldogs face Delaware State on Saturday, Oct. 20 at Oliver C. Dawson Stadium, it’s quite possibly the last homecoming game for Pough, who’s not expected to return to the sidelines next year.
“Well, we haven’t officially called it q...

The National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) has launched a global news feature series on the history, contemporary realities and implications of the transatlantic slave trade. This is Part 5 in the ongoing series.
(Read the entire series: Slavery Part 1, Slavery Part 2, Slavery Part 3, Slavery Part 4, Slavery Part 5)
By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Correspondent@StacyBrownMedia
“I prefer to be true to myself, even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule of others. Rather than to be ...