More than half of Russia’s drug investigators say they do not trust the COVID-19 vaccine by President Vladimir Putin because the country announced it had begun its widespread production.
Russia’s health ministry said on Saturday that production of the vaccine, developed by the Gamaleya Institute outside Moscow, had “started” with the Tass news agency reporting that 20 countries had requested the delivery of one billion doses.
However, it appears that enthusiasm for the vaccine expressed by Putin, who said it was taken by one of his daughters and offers “sustainable immunity”, is not shared by the Russian medical institution.
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In an online survey of more than 3,000 health care professionals via the Doctor’s Handbook app, 52 percent of those taking the medicine said they would not take the vaccine.
Of those skeptics, nearly two-thirds, like 66 percent, said there was not enough data to prove it was effective, and just under half, like 48 percent, said it was developing too fast.
However, one-fifth of those who refuse inoculation would still recommend the vaccine, called Sputnik V, to others. Less than a quarter of the drugs surveyed, or 24.5 percent, said they would be vaccinated in it.
The survey of 3,040 Russian medical professionals on August 12 and 13, was reported by the RBC news website.
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Russia’s deputy health minister, Oleg Salagay, said he was not surprised by the survey’s findings, and that “confidence should be earned over the years.”
“Confidence should not be confused with an objective assessment of effectiveness and safety. And the results of such an assessment can help experts today draw a conclusion about the possibility of using the vaccine,” he wrote in a post on Telegram.
From the end of August, frontline health workers and teachers in Russia will be the first to be vaccinated with the viral vaccine, which is an injection solution based on the adenovirus, as the fever, and divided into two doses.
Gamaleya has said the vaccine will give two years of Covid-19 immunity, but the speed of its development has raised alarm bells among many experts.
Professor of immunology at Imperial College London, Danny Altmann, said earlier this week that it was “almost impossible” to have enough control over the adverse effects of the vaccine undertaken by Russian scientists.
“We have high bar and strict licensing criteria for faxes after Phase Three trials, so none of us can fully understand the details in the Russian press releases because they are not completely transparent in terms of hard data,” he said. hy Newsweek.
This graph provided by Statista shows the worldwide spread of the coronavirus.
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