MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia plans to produce 30 million doses of an experimental COVID-19 vaccine domestically this year, with the potential to manufacture another 170 million abroad, the head of the country’s sovereign wealth fund told Reuters.
FILE PHOTO: Kirill Dmitriev, director of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), attends a meeting chaired by Russian President Vladimir Putin on the outskirts of Moscow, Russia, on March 11, 2020. Sputnik / Mikhail Klimentyev / Kremlin via REUTERS / File Photo
The first human trial of the vaccine, a one-month trial of 38 people, ended this week. The researchers concluded that it is safe to use and induces an immune response, although the strength of that response is not yet clear.
A larger phase III trial involving several thousand people is expected to begin in August, said director of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), Kirill Dmitriev.
“We believe that, based on current results, it will be approved in Russia in August and in some other countries in September … making it possibly the first vaccine approved in the world,” he said in an interview.
More than 100 possible vaccines are being developed to try to stop the pandemic. At least two are in final phase III human trials, according to data from the World Health Organization, one developed by Sinopharm of China and the other by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford.
Producers are also grappling with the question of how to massively scale production to meet global needs.
THE GROUP IMMUNITY
Dmitriev said the Russia Phase III trial will be held at home and in two countries in the Middle East, and will begin after a Phase II trial of 100 people ends on August 3.
Russia was in talks with Saudi Arabia to be a test site and a manufacturing partner, it said in a separate press conference.
The Moscow Gamaleya Institute, which developed the Russian candidate vaccine, is producing doses for clinical trials, while private pharmaceutical firms Alium, part of the Sistema-R-Pharm conglomerate, are handling the bottling.
They are both updating their lab setup so they can take over production in the coming months, Dmitriev said.
“There is a general feeling that 40 to 50 million people need to be vaccinated for so-called group immunity in Russia,” he told Reuters.
“So we believe we will be in good shape producing around 30 million (doses nationwide) this year and then we can finish vaccination next year.”
Russia had also reached manufacturing agreements with five other countries and could be producing up to 170 million doses abroad this year, Dmitriev said.
He declined to say where or give details on the prices, but said that countries in Latin America, the Middle East and elsewhere had expressed interest in importing the vaccine.
Russia also reached an agreement with drug maker AstraZeneca about its potential COVID-19 vaccine, called AZD1222. “We hope that one of our portfolio companies is also working … on the production of the AstraZeneca vaccine in Russia,” said Dmitriev.
Written by Polina Ivanova, edited by Kate Kelland and John Stonestreet
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