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Sputnik V is one of three vaccines that have made it through Phase II testing but the US competitor AstraZeneca Plc announced it was halting trials after one of the test subjects became ill.
“Sputnik is a human vaccine, while AstroZeneca’s is a monkey vaccine,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on September 8 on a conference call. “Our scientists believe that the human vaccine is much more reliable in this regard.”
Even though the Phase III trials have only begun the RDIF has already started manufacturing the vaccine in bulk with the first deliveries due to be dispatched in November and December, the Russian Healthcare Minister Mikhail Murashko said on September 7 during a working visit to Arkhangelsk.
The minister noted that now it is also important to begin inoculation against the flu and that the Arkhangelsk Region has already received batches of this vaccine.
The ministry's announcement follows a flurry of reports saying that several high-level Russian government officials have received the Sputnik V vaccine and made public appearances in good health.
The state-run Gamaleya epidemiology and microbiology research centre that developed Sputnik V has estimated that it would need to produce 80mn doses to achieve mass immunity.
Russia has officially reported more than 1mn coronavirus infections and almost 18,000 deaths since recording its first case in March.
If mass vaccination goes to plan, Russia will have seen an end to Covid-19 by next summer, Alexander Gintsburg, the director of Moscow's Gamaleya Centre said on September 8.
Gintsburg believes the world will only be able to defeat the pandemic after mass vaccination, which he thinks can happen within a year. Until then, he predicts that society will be engaged in "constant battles" with the virus.
"We'll only be able to say that the pandemic has receded when we've produced the required amount of vaccine and vaccinated the entire population of our country and part of the globe," he said as cited by RT.
2.4 Russian state to field three new political parties in the 2011 Duma elections
Three newly registered political parties will be able to take part in Russia's State Duma elections next year without collecting the required voter signatures following electoral successes in the September 13 Russian regional elections, Central Election Commission chief Ella Pamfilova said on September 14.
14 RUSSIA Country Report October 2020 www.intellinews.com
