[ad_1]
Brazil’s pharmaceutical supervisory body Anvisa on Monday rejected a request from several states to allow the importation of a Russian vaccine, saying it did not have the data necessary to confirm the safety and efficacy of the vaccine.
“Anvisa’s delay in approving Sputnik V is unfortunately political in nature and has nothing to do with access to information or science,” reads the official Sputnik V Twitter account.
The message highlights a recent US government report that Washington tried to persuade Brazil not to use Sputnik V.
“In a 2020 report released a few months ago, the US Department of Health said the US health attaché had ‘persuaded Brazil to abandon the Russian COVID-19 vaccine,'” Sputnik V said in a official Twitter account.
Anvisa said its experts had recorded “uncertainties” about the vaccine, which had not yet been approved by either the European Medicines Agency (EVA) or the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
Currently, Sputnik V is approved by at least 60 countries, including more than ten countries in Latin and Central America.
Earlier this month, Argentina signed an agreement with Russia to become the first Latin American country to produce Sputnik V. It will aim to start production of these vaccines at full capacity in June.
The Kremlin said Tuesday that it needed more information to comment on the Brazilian decision. According to President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, the issue has not been discussed with the Brazilian authorities.
However, Peskov added: “We do not support the use of vaccines as a political tool.”
Russia registered the Sputnik V vaccine, named after the first artificial satellite launched by the Soviet Union in August last year, before conducting large-scale clinical trials. For this reason, Western experts and some Russians have raised concerns about the urgency of developing the drug, and critics have described it as a means of increasing Russia’s geopolitical influence.
However, subsequent evaluations have been largely positive: Research published by the authoritative medical journal The Lancet shows that Sputnik V is a safe vaccine and its efficacy exceeds 90 percent.
[ad_2]
