Russia is the Frontrunner with Sputnik V

President Vladimir Putin has announced that Russia’s health ministry has granted regulatory approval for Phase 3 clinical trials of the Sputnik V vaccine, which will begin very shortly, with tens of thousands of people in the Moscow region being vaccinated to gauge its efficacy and safety. In doing so, Russia has become the front runner in the high-stakes global race to find an effective vaccine for COVID-19.  The vaccine, developed by Moscow’s Gamaleya Institute, along with the Defense Ministry, has been found to work “quite effectively” and formed “stable immunity” against COVID-19, according to the proud president.

Sputnik V is named after the famous first artificial satellite developed by Russia, and is as momentous an event as the country’s pioneering space achievement. In fact, so momentous is the occasion that a 38-second promotional video has been produced by the Russian Direct Investment Fund showing how the Sputnik V vaccine slowly but surely eradicates the novel coronavirus from the world. Similarly, another video has also been created that shows how the vaccine is being produced. Sputnik V raced through its Phase 1 and Phase 2 clinical trials in a record time of around two months. Russian Health Minister Mikhail Murashko said that the first batch of shots in Phase 3 would be given to doctors on a voluntary basis.

Expectedly, given the present- day extremely divisive politics and the high sensitivity of the subject, Sputnik V has been met with skepticism by health officials in the West, who are questioning the efficacy and safety of the vaccine, especially because results of the human clinical trials have not been published till date. Amidst all this, Alexander Gintsburg, Director of the Gamaleya National Research Center for Epidemiology and Microbiology, has been quoted as saying, “Our researchers have been working at the Gamaleya Institute for 10 years…Any American or European university can only dream of having such researchers. And they are seeking to lure them away. But they won’t be able to.”

Russia has announced that the vaccine will be available by September, with mass vaccination beginning in October. According to Kirill Dmitriev, head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund, the country will be producing  five million doses a month by December-January, with some 20 countries already in line with request for over one billion doses.

Ref: The Indian Express, August 18, 2020,