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In August last year, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin announced that the country had authorized the use of the world’s first Covid-19 vaccine even before completing safety tests, prompting skepticism. Now, Putin can reap diplomatic dividends as Russia celebrates its biggest scientific breakthrough since the Soviet era.
Countries line up to receive Sputnik V after peer-reviewed results published in the medical journal The Lancet show that the Russian vaccine protects against the coronavirus, as well as vaccines in the US and Europe, and much more effectively than rival Chinese vaccines.
At least 20 countries have approved the vaccine, including Hungary, a member of the European Union, while major markets such as Brazil and India are close to authorizing the immunizer. Now Russia is looking to the EU market, while the bloc faces obstacles in its vaccination program due to a lack of vaccines.
In the global battle to defeat a pandemic that killed 2.3 million people in just over a year, the race for vaccines has taken on geopolitical importance with governments trying to overcome the enormous social and economic damage caused by imposed restrictions. to limit the spread of the vaccine virus. This gives Russia an advantage as one of the few countries where scientists have produced an effective vaccine.
The decision to call the vaccine Sputnik V, the name of the world’s first satellite whose launch in 1957 gave the Soviet Union a major triumph over the United States to launch the space race, highlighted the scale of importance that the Moscow government attached the fact. . The results of the final trials with 20,000 participants reviewed in The Lancet showed that the vaccine has an efficacy rate of 91.6%.
“This is a turning point for us,” said Kirill Dmitriev, director general of the Russian sovereign wealth fund (RDIF), who supported the development of Sputnik V and is responsible for international implementation.
Production restrictions are the biggest challenge facing all manufacturers as global demand far exceeds supply. Russia, which promised free vaccines for a population of 146 million, began production last year and the vaccine is currently being manufactured in countries such as India, South Korea and Brazil.
Despite Russia’s success, domestic demand remains tepid so far, partly due to distrust of the population. Putin, 68, fueled skepticism in December when he said he was waiting for the vaccine to be approved for people his age.
Putin has not yet said whether he has been vaccinated, but other nations do not want to wait for an answer. After announcing that he had tested positive for Covid-19, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said on January 25 that he had thanked Putin for promising 24 million doses of Sputnik V over the next two months. Three days later, the president of Bolivia, Luis Arce, personally received a package at the La Paz airport.
European approval could take several months due to the need to submit detailed data, The Lancet editor-in-chief Richard Horton said in an interview with Bloomberg. “I really think the Russian vaccine will be available,” but “not quickly,” he said.
Although Russia expects the vaccine to be available to 700 million people this year, it faces production limitations. “We have to be realistic. Due to our other commitments, we will not be able to supply Europe before May, except Hungary,” said RDIF’s Dmitriev.
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